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P1LANI [ Rajasthan ) 

Class No. S 4/. 2 
Bock No. W* 4* <£/ 2 J!? 

Accession No. ^32.^ ^ 




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ERRATA 

Due to an oversight in the second printing, three lines have been 
omitted from the bottom of page 92. These should read: 

priority is discussed in a thorough manner in Dr. Jorgensen’s book, “Die 
Entdeckung des Sauer st off esff which was translated from Danish into Ger- 
man by Ortwed and Speter. 




Frontispiece to the German Translation op 
P.-J* Macqtjer's “Dictionnaire de Chymie,” 1788 


DISCOVERY OF THE 
ELEMENTS 


by 

MARY ELVIRA WEEKS 

Research Associate in Scientific Litera- 
ture at the Kresge- Hooker Scientific Li- 
brary, Wayne University . With illus- 
trations collected by F. B. Dains, Pro- 
fessor of Chemistry at the University of 
Kansas 



Published by 

JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION 



Copyright, 1943. 


JOURNAL OF CHE 
EA$J< 


L^PUCATION 


FIFTH EDITION 
ENLARGED AND REVISED 

„ y,v W 

Secoud 1948 


Printed in U.S.A. 

MACK PRINTING COMPANY 
EASTON, PA. 



FOREWORD 


The material blessings that man enjoys today have resulted largely from his 
ever-increasing knowledge of about ninety simple substances , the chemical 
elements , most of which were entirely unknown to ancient civilizations. In the 
luxurious thermcB of the Roman patrician , with all their lavish display of 
alabaster floors, porphyry walls, marble stairs , and mosaic ceilings , no nickel- 
plated or chromium fixtures were to be seen; among his artistic golden bowls 
and goblets no platinum or tantalum objects were ever to be found ; with all his 
spoils of war he could not buy the smallest aluminum trinket. 

Even the haughtiest Roman conqueror was earthbound , for he knew no light 
metal like aluminum or magnesium and no light gas like hydrogen or helium 
to make lofty flight possible. Without a lantern in his hand , he could not walk 
along the splendid lava pavements of the city streets at night , for the white 
glow of the tungsten filament and the crimson glow of the neon tube were lacking. 
The water that came to him from mountain springs , lakes , and rivers through 
miles of magnificent aqueducts was a menace to health , for there was no chlo- 
rine with which to kill the bacteria , When accident befell him , there was no 
iodine for the healing of the wound; when he lay gas ping for breath , no cylinder 
of oxygen to save him. 

The story of the disclosure , one by one , of the chemical elements has never 
been told as a connected narrative. The reports of these discoveries and the 
life stories of the discoverers are recorded for the most part in old chemical 
journals , biographical dictionaries , old letters , and obsolete textbooks that 
are seldom read by 'the busy modern chemist. It is hoped , therefore , that 
these chapters may not only render tribute to the honored men and women who 
helped to reveal the hidden chemical elements , but that they may also serve to 
acquaint chemists and others with these great achievements. 

The task of selecting and eliminating material has been pleasant but difficult. 
It has frequently happened that two or more men have discovered the same 
element independently. In other instances various observers have recognized the 
existence of a new element long before it was actually isolated. In such cases 
an attempt has been made to relate all important steps in the discovery as fairly 
and completely as possible without ascribing the honor of discovery to any one 
person. 


It is a pleasure to acknowledge the kind assistance given by the late Dr. 
E. H. S. Bailey and Dr. Selma Gottlieb Kallis, who read portions of the manu- 
script, by Dr. F. B. Dains, who made many helpful suggestions as to sources 
of material and furnished most of the illustrations , and by the late Dr. Max 
Speter, who read the proof for the fourth edition. 

iii 




CONTENTS 


Page 

Foreword iii 

List of Illustrations vii 

I. Elements Known to the Ancient World 1 

II. Elements Known to the Alchemists 19 

III. Supplementary Note on the Discovery of Phosphorus 41 

IV. Some Eighteenth-Century Metals 58 

V. Three Important Gases 82 

VI. Daniel Rutherford and His Services to Chemistry 106 

VII. Chromium, Molybdenum, Tungsten, and Uranium 121 

VIII. The Scientific Contributions of the de Elhuyar Brothers 143 

IX. Tellurium and Selenium 157 

X. The Klaproth-Kitaibel Correspondence on the Discovery of Tellurium. . 169 

XI. Columbium, Tantalum, and Vanadium 183 

XII. The Chemical Contributions of Charles Hatchett 206 

XIII. The Scientific Contributions of Don Andres Manuel del Rio 225 

XIV. The Platinum Metals 236 

XV. Three Alkali Metals: Potassium, Sodium, and Lithium 269 

XVI. J. A. Arfwedson and His Services to Chemistry 285 

XVII. The Alkaline Earth Metals and Magnesium and Cadmium 295 

XVIII. Some Elements Isolated with the Aid of Potassium and Sodium: Zir- 
conium, Titanium, Cerium, and Thorium 316 

XIX. Other Elements Isolated with the Aid of Potassium and Sodium : Beryl- 
lium, Boron, Silicon, and Aluminum 330 

XX. Some Spectroscopic Discoveries 363 

XXI. The Periodic System of the Elements 385 

XXII. Some Elements Predicted by Mendeleeff 399 

XXIII. The Rare-Earth Elements 414 

XXIV. The Halogen Family 438 

XXV. The Inert Gases 469 

XXVI. The Nat ural Radioactive Elements 484 

XXVII. Recently Discovered Elements , 513 

A List of the Chemical Elements 550 

Chronology 552 

Appendix 565 

Index 566 


v 




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Page 

Frontispiece of P.-J. Macquer's “Dictionary of Chemistry'* Frontispiece 

Hermes Trismegistos Tit le-page 

Heraclitus, 540-475 B.C 1 

Seventeenth-Century Symbol for Iron 2 

Seventeenth-Century Symbol for Silver 2 

Pliny the Elder, 23-79 A.D 3 

Assay Furnace, 1540 4 

Frontispiece to A. A. Barba's “Art of the Metals," 1733 French Edition 6 

Mercury Stills, 1540 ' 8 

Woodcut Showing Distillation of Sulfur in 1 557 10 

Manufacture of Wood Charcoal 11 

Georgius Agricola, 1494-1555 13 

Sixteenth-Century Cartoon cn Alchemy : 19 

Albert us Magnus, 1193-1280 21 

Seventeenth-Century Alchernistic Symbol for Arsenic 22 

Seventeenth-Century Alchernistic Symbol for Antimony 22 

Calcination of Antimony, 1751 23 

Basilius Valentinus 24 

Nicolas Lemery, 1645-1715 25 

Frontispiece of Johann Schroeder’s Pharmacopoeia, 1046 27 

Johann Kunckel von Lowenstern, 1630-1702 29 

The Alchemist, by D. Teniers (1610-1690) 33 

Robert Boyle, 1627-1691 35 

Guillaum e-Fran^ois Rouelle, 1703-1770 37 

“The Alehymist Discovers Phosphorus," by Joseph Wright of Derby (1734-1797). 42 

Ambrose Godfrey, 1685-1756 43 

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, 1646-1710 44 

Ambrose Godfrey Hanckwitz, 1660-1741 48 

Max Speter, 1883-1942 50 

Johann Heinrich Linck, 1675-1735 51 

Johan Gottschalk Wallerius, 1709-1785 54 

Andreas Sigismund Marggraf, 1709-1782 58 

Production of Zinc in China, 1637 59 

Richard Watson, 1737-1816 61 

Bernard Palissy, 1510P-1589 65 

Urban Hiarae, 1641-1724 4 70 

Balthasar-Georges Sage, 1740-1824 71 

Torbern Bergman, 1735-1784 72 

Johan Gottlieb Gahn, 1745-1818 73 

Georg Ernst Stahl, 1660-1734 82 

Johann Joachim Becher, 1635-1682 83 

Henry Cavendish, 1731-1810 84 

Lady Banks 85 

Sir Joseph Banks, 1743-1820 85 

Cavendish's House at Clapham 86 

vii 



viii 


List of Illustrations 


Page 

Daniel Rutherford, 1749-1819 87 

Joseph Black, 1728-1799 88 

Leonardo da Vinci, 1452-1519 90 

Robert Hooke’s Home, Montague House 91 

Johannes Mayow, 1641-1679 92 

The Stuart Portrait of Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804 93 

Title Page of Bayen’s “Opuscules Chimiques" 94 

Priestley's Apparatus for Studying the Composition of the Atmosphere 95 

Priestley's Laboratory 96 

Dedication of Priestley’s “Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of 

Air," 1774 97 

Stralsund, the Birthplace of Scheele 98 

Youthful Portrait of Carl Wilhelm Scheele, 1742-1786 99 

Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, 1743-1794, and Mme. Lavoisier 100 

Statue of Lavoisier 101 

Hermann Boerhaave, 1668-1738 108 

Sir Walter Scott, 1771-1832 109 

Stephen Hales, 1677-1761 Ill 

John Hope, 1725-1786 114 

Cartoon Showing a Controversy in 1817 over the Founding of a Chair of Com- 
parative Anatomy 115 

Daniel Rutherford’s Maximum and Minimum Thermometer 118 

Lampadius’ Laboratory at Freiberg, I860 121 

Borjeson’s Statue of Carl Wilhelm Scheele 123 

Fausto de Elhuyar, 1755-1833 124 

Vacuum Tube Showing the Use of Tantalum and Molybdenum 126 

Torbern Olof Bergman, 1735-1784 129 

Martin Heinrich Klaproth, 1743-1817 131 

The Rose Pharmacy in Berlin 132 

Valentin Rose the Younger, 1762-1807 133 

Translator’s Preface to Klaproth’s “Analytical Essays" 134 

Hermbstadt’s Dedication of Scheele’s Works 135 

Nicolas-Louis Vauquelin, 1763-1829 136 

Eugene Peligot, 181 1-1890 136 

Peter Simon Pallas, 1741-1811 137 

Antoine-Fran$ois de Fourcroy, 1755-1809, and Autograph 138 

Mathieu-Joseph-Bonaventure Orfila, 1787-1853 139 

The Seminary of Vergara, Spain 144 

Fausto de Elhuyar, 1755-1833 145 

Abraham Gottlob Werner, 1750-1817 146 

Don Andrds Manuel del Rio, 1764-1849 147 

Baron Alexander von Humboldt, 1769-1859 148 

Dedication of the History of the College of Mines of Mexico 150 

Fausto de Elhuyar 151 

The School of Mines in Mexico City 153 

Youthful Portrait of Berzelius 158 

Paul Kitaibel, 1757-1817 159 

Second-Floor Plan of Berzelius’ Laboratory and Dwelling House 160 

Gustav Magnus, 1802-1870 161 

balances Used by Berzelius • *653 



List of Illustrations 


ix 


Page 

The Fahlun Mine, the Oldest Copper Mine in Sweden 163 

Alexander Mareet, 1770-1822 164 

Berzelius Autograph Letter 166 

Jons Jacob Berzelius, 1779-1848 167 

Tellurium Medallion 170 

Selenium Portrait Medallion of Berzelius 171 

Ignaz Edler von Born, 1742-1791 172 

The Former School of Mining and Forestry at Schemnitz, or Selmeczbanya 174 

“Belhazy” at Schemnitz 175 

Charles Hatchett, 1765-1847 183 

John Winthrop the Younger 1606-1676 184 

Sir Hans Sloane, 1660-1753 185 

Photomicrograph of Columbium 186 

Autograph Letter of Charles Hatchett 187 

Anders Gustaf Ekeberg, 1767-1813 188 

Henri Moissan, 1852-1907 188 

Heinrich Rose, 1795-1864 189 

Thomas Thomson, 1773-1852 191 

Laboratory Equipment Made from Tantalum 192 

Tantalum for Watch Cases 193 

Sefstrom’s Autograph on Title Page of Berzelius’ Treatise on the Blowpipe 193 

Nils Gabriel Sefstrom, 1787-1845 194 

Taberg, Sm&land, Sweden 196 

Andres Manuel del Rio, 1764-1849 197 

Sir Edward (T. E.) Thorpe, 1845-1925 198 

Carl Friedrich Rammelsberg, 1813-1899 199 

Sir Henry Enfield Roscoe, 1833-1915 201 

Dedication Page from Brande’s “Manual of Chemistry” 207 

William Thomas Brande, 1788-1866 208 

Statue of Sir Hans Sloane, 1660-1753 209 

John Winthrop, 1681-1747 213 

Dedication of J. A. Cramer’s “Elements of the Art of Assaying Metals” 214 

Cavendish’s Apparatus for Testing Coins 216 

Michel-Eug6ne Chevreul, 1786-1889 218 

Charles Hatchett, 1765-1847 220 

Title Page of del Rio’s “Elements of Oryctognosy” 228 

Autograph Letter of A. M. del Rio 229 

Dedication Page of Mamirez’ “Mineral Wealth of Mexico” 231 

Julius Caesar Scaliger, 1484-1558 236 

Don Antonio de Ulloa, 1716-1795 237 

Sir William Watson, 1715-1787 ^ 237 

Watson's and Brownrigg’s Descriptions of Platinum 240 

Title Page of Macquer’s Chemical Dictionary 241 

Antoine Baum6, 1728-1804 242 

Bertrand Pelletier, 1761-1797 242 

Jos6 Celestino Mutis, 1732-1808 245 

Robert Hare, 1781-1858 248 

A Page from Sefstr&m’s Laboratory Notes 250 

N. G. Sefstrom ’s Portable Eight-Blast Forge 251 

Bdlows Used with Sefstrdm’s Forge. . . / 252 



X 


List of Illustrations 


Page 

William Hyde Wollaston, 1766- 1828 254 

Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffoti, 1707-1788 255 

Karl Karlovich Klaus, 1796-1864 260 

J. Henri Debray, 1827-1888 . . 264 

Henri-Louis Du Hamel du Monceau, 1 700-1782 ... 270 

Sir Humphry Davy, 1778-1829 273 

Electrochemical Apparatus of Sir Humphry Davy 274 

Dr. Thomas Beddoes, 1760-1808 ... 275 

Apparatus of Sir Humphry Davy ... 276 

Autograph Letter of Sir Humphry Davy 277 

St. Michael’s Mount and Bay near Penzance, Cornwall 278 

J. B. de Andrada, 1763-1838 ... 279 

Edward Daniel Clarke, 1769-1822 280 

Johan August Arfwedson, 1792-1841 . . 286 

Berzelius’ Blowpipe Lamp 287 

Sir Humphry Davy, 1778-1829 . . 296 

Title-Page of the "Chemical Works of Caspar Neumann,’’ 1683-1737 297 

Thomas Charles Hope, 1766-1844 298 

M. M. af Pontin, 1781-1858 299 

Richard Kirwan, 1733-1812 299 

Ulisse Aldrovandi, 1522-1605? 300 

Benjamin Silliman the Elder, 1778-1864 304 

Johann Rudolph Glauber, 1604-1670. . . 305 

Antoine- Alexandre Brutus Bussy, 1794-1882 306 

Side View of the Ecole Superieure de Pharmacie, Paris 307 

Friedrich Stromeyer, 1776-1835 308 

Exhibit of Drugs at the £cole Superieure de Pharmacie, Paris 309 

Guyton-Morveau, 1737-1816 317 

Introduction of William Gregor’s Original Paper on Titanium 318 

D. Lorentz von Crell, 1744-1816 319 

Martin Heinrich Klaproth, 1743-1817 320 

Sven Otto Pettersson, 1848-1941 321 

M. A. Hunter’s Bomb for Preparing Metallic Titanium 322 

Statue of Carl Wilhelm Scheele at Koping, Sweden ... 322 

Axel Fredrik Cronstedt, 1722-1765 323 

Skinnskatteberg, Vestmanland, Sweden 324 

Mine Head-Frame at Riddarhyttan 325 

William Francis Hillebrand, 1853-1925 326 

Thomas H. Norton, 1851-1941 326 

Wilhelm Hisinger, 1766-1852 327 

Ren£-Just Hatty, 1743-1822 331 

Johann Friedrich Gmelin, 1748-1804 332 

Crystals of Pure Beryllium Prepared by P. Lebeau 332 

Dedication Page of Thenard’s “Trait£ de Chimie” 333 

Louis-Joseph Gay-Lussac, 1778-1850 333 

Louis-Jacques Thenard, 1777-1857 336 

Gay-Ltxssac and Biot Making their Balloon Ascension 337 

The Battery that Napoleon Presented to the 6cole Polytechnique 338 

Title Page of Gay-Lussac’s and Thenard ’s "Recherches Physico-Chim iques’ ’ 339 

Raffaelk) Nastni, 1854-1931 340 



List of Illustrations xt 

Page 

Hans Christian Oersted, 1777-1851 345 

Friedrich Wdhler, 1800-1 882 347 

Leopold Gmelin, 1788-1853 348 

The Wohler Plaque, Cast in Aluminum 348 

Justus von Liebig, 1803-1873 349 

Wdhler’s Home at Gottingen 350 

Louis-L£once 6lie de Beaumont, 1798-1874 351 

Wohler in Later Life 352 

Charles Sainte-Claire Deville, 1814-1876, and His Brother, Henri, 1818-1881 .... 353 

Frank Fanning Jewett, 1844-1926 354 

The Aluminum "Crown Jewels" 355 

Charles Martin Hall, 1863-1914 356 

Paul-Louis-Toussaint H6roult, 1863-1914 357 

William Henry Fox Talbot, 1800-1877 362 

Joseph Fraunhofer Exhibiting His Spectroscope 364 

David Alter, 1807-1881 365 

Sir David Brewster, 1781-1868 365 

Bunsen’s Old Laboratory at Heidelberg 366 

Heinrich Debus, 1824-1915 366 

Gustav Robert Kirchhoff, 1824-1887 367 

The Kirchhoff -Bunsen Spectroscope 368 

Robert Wilhelm Bunsen, 1811-1899 369 

G. Kirchhoff, R. W. Bunsen, and H. E. Roscoe in 1862 370 

Carl Friedrich Plattner, 1800-1858 371 

Preface to Plattner’s "Blowpipe Analysis" 372 

Hermann von Helmholtz, 1821-1894 373 

Bunsen Memorial in Heidelberg 374 

August Wilhelm von Hofmann, 1818-1892 375 

Sir William Crookes, 1832-1919 376 

Jean-Baptiste-Andre Dumas, 1800-1884 377 

Ferdinand Reich, 1799-1882 378 

Claude- Auguste Lamy, 1820-1878 378 

Chemical Laboratory at the Freiberg School of Mines 379 

Hieronymus Theodor Richter, 1824-1898 380 

Johann Wolfgang Dobereiner, 1780-1849 j 385 

A Portion of the Telluric Screw of Beguyer de Chancourtois 386 

John Alexander Reina Newlands, 1837-1898 387 

Lothar Meyer’s Periodic Curve of Atomic Volumes 388 

Lothar Meyer, 1830-1895 , 389 

Dmitri Ivanovich Mendel£eff, 1834-1907 390 

Henri Victor Regnault, 1810-1878 391 

Mendel6eff’s Periodic Table of the Elements , 392 

D. Mendel6eff and Bohuslav Brauner in Prague, 1900 393 

Lewis Reeve Gibbes, 1810-1894 394 

Gibbes’ Synoptic Table, 1875 395 

Gibbes’ Diagram, 1875 395 

Alexandre-Emile Beguyer de Chancourtois, 1820-1886 396 

Lecoq de Boisbaudran, 1838-1912 399 

Adolph Wurtz, 1817-1884 400 

£xhile~Cl&nient Jungdeisch, 1839-1916 401 



List of Illustrations 


xii 

Page 

Lars Fredrik Nilson, 1840- 1899 403 

Berzelius at the Age of Forty-Four Years 404 

Inside the City Wall of Visby 405 

Old Apothecary Shop at Visby 406 

Tobias Robert Thaten, 1827-1905 407 

Clemens Alexander Winkler, 1838-1904 408 

Portrait Medallion of Berzelius by David d ’Angers 408 

Nils Gabriel Sef strom, 1787-1845 409 

Albin Weisbach, 1833-1901 410 

Johan Gadolin, 1 760-1852 414 

The Gadolin Medal 415 

Abo, Finland, in 1823 415 

Carl Gustav Mosander, 1797-1858 416 

Carl Axel Arrhenius, 1757-1824 417 

Johan August Arfwedson, 1792-1841 418 

Autograph Letter of C. G. Mosander 419 

Didymium Glass Goggles 420 

Marc Delafontaine, 1837-1911 420 

Jean-Charles Galissard de Marignae, 1817-1894 421 

J. Lawrence Smith, 1818-1883 422 

Portrait of Berzelius in 1845 423 

Betty Berzelius nee Poppius, 181 1-1884 423 

P. T. Cleve, 1840-1905 * 424 

Berzelius’ Laboratory 425 

J6ns Jacob Berzelius, 1779-1848 426 

Baron Auer von Weisbach, 1858-1929 426 

Birthplace of Berzelius 427 

Caroline Institute of Medicine and Surgery, Stockholm 428 

Herbert Newby McCoy, 1870-1 945 429 

Eug&ne- Anatole Demargay, 1852-1904 430 

Berzelius’ Grave in the Solna Churchyard 431 

Georges Urbain, 1872-1938 432 

Portrait Plaque of Paul Schiitzenberger by G. Urbain 433 

William Henry, 1775-1836 439 

Title Page of William Henry’s "Epitome of Chemistry” 439 

Count Claude-Louis Berthollet, 1748-1822 440 

Sir Humphry Davy, 1778-1829 440 

Jdns Jacob Berzelius, 1779-1848 441 

Anna Sundstrdm, Berzelius’ Housekeeper 442 

The Old Dijon Academy and the Birthplace of Bernard Courtois 443 

Autograph of Bernard Courtois, 1794 444 

Iodine Prepared by Courtois 445 

Jean-Antoine-Claude Chaptal, Comte de Chanteloup, 1750-1832 446 

Jean-Fran$ois Coindet, 1774-1834 447 

Carl Ldwig, 1803-1890 449 

Antoine- J6r6me Balard, 1802-1876 451 

A Laboratory of Mmeralogical Chemistry at the Sorbonne 452 

Andr4-Marie Ampere, 1775-1836 456 

Paulin Louyet, 1818-1850 457 

Apparatus Used by the Knox Brothers in Their Attempts to Liberate Fluorine. . . 458 , 



List of Illustrations 


xiii 
Page 

Edmond Fremy, 1814-1894 459 

Dr. George Gore, 1826-1908 459 

Moissan Preparing Fluorine in His Laboratory at the £cole de Pharmacie, Paris. . 460 

Pierre-Eugene-Marcelin Berthelot, 1827-1907 461 

Alfred E. Stock 463 

Henri Moissan, 1852-1907/ 464 

Robert John Strutt, the Third Lord Rayleigh, 1842-1919 470 

Sir William Ramsay, 1852-1916 471 

Rudolf Fittig, 1835-1910 472 

Ira Remsen, 1846-1927 473 

Pierre-Jules-C£sar Janssen, 1824-1907 474 

French Medallion Honoring Janssen and Lockyer 475 

Sir Joseph Norman Lockyer, 1836-1920 476 

Per Theodor Cleve, 1840-1905 477 

Hamilton P. Cady, 1874-1943 478 

Sir William Ramsay, 1852-1916 479 

Morris William Travers 480 

Pierre Curie, 1859-1906 484 

Antoine-Henri Becquerel, 1852-1908 m . 485 

Henri Poincare, 1854-1912 486 

Gabriel Lippmann, 1 845-192 1 486 

Laboratory in which M. and Mme. Curie Discovered Radium 487 

Group Portrait of Lord Rutherford and Other Contributors to Radioactivity 488 

Autograph Letter from Mme. Curie to Dr. Edgar F. Smith 489 

Mme. Marie Sklodowska Curie, 1867-1934 490 

Kasimir Fajans 492 

Bertram Borden Boltwood, 1870-1927 493 

Harriet Brooks (Mrs. Frank Pitcher) 493 

Condensation of Radon, McGill University, 1902 494 

Lord Rutherford, 1871-1937 495 

Theodore William Richards, 1868-1928 498 

John A. Cranston 498 

Crystals of Potassium Protoactinium Fluoride 499 

Apparatus Used by A. V. Grosse in Researches on Protoactinium 500 

Alexander Smith Russell 501 

Alexander Fleck 501 

R. B. Owens. . . 502 

Frederick Soddy 502 

Mme. Curie and Her Daughter, Mme. Joliot-Curie 503 

The Curie Family 504 

Jean-Fr£d6ric Joliot 505 

Mme. Ir&ne Joliot-Curie 505 

The Radioactive Isotopes and Their Transformations 506 

Henry Gwyn Jeffreys Moseley, 1887-1915 514 

Georg von Hevesy 517 

Dirk Coster 518 

J. Heyrovsk^ 519 

William Frederick Meggers 520 

Bohuslav Brauner, 1855-1935 , 521 

Charles James, 1880-1928 522 



XIV 


List of Illustrations 


Page 

B. Smith Hopkins 623 

Laboratory for Rare-Earth Fractionation, University of Illinois 524 

X-Ray Apparatus, University of Illinois 525 

Luigi Rolla 526 



THE DISCOVERY OF THE ELEMENTS 


I. ELEMENTS KNOWN TO THE ANCIENT WORLD 

Although the ancient conception of an element was quite different from the 
modem one , a few of the substances now recognized as chemical elements have 
been known and used since the dawn of history . Although no one knows 
who discovered these ancient “building-stones of the universe ” the writings of 
Pliny the Elder and Dioscorides and the Hebrew and Hindu Scriptures abound 
in interesting allusions to the metals , gold, silver , copper , iron , lead, tin , and 
mercury , and the non-metals , sulfur and carbon . 


“The world of chemical reactions is like a stage , on 
which scene after scene is ceaselessly played. The 
actors on it are the elements ” (2). 



><#» Delbrueck's •• Antikt Portr&ts” 


Heraclitus, 540-475 B.C. 

Ascetic Greek philosopher and founder of metaphysics. He believed that fire is the 
primary substance, and that change is the only actuality in Nature. 


The chemical elements, those primeval building materials from which 
Nature has constructed all her varied forms, have been discovered, one by 
one, through the ages, by patient searchers in many lands. The ancient 

1 




Seventeenth-Century Symbol for 
Iron 




Chemical Elements 


3 


Greek philosophers, Thales, Xenophanes, and Heraclitus, believed that 
all substances were composed of a single element, but they did not agree as 
to its nature. Thales thought that water was the element which, upon 
evaporating and condensing, produced all substances. Heraclitus, how- 
ever, believed that fire was the one fundamental building material. 

The conception of four simple substances (earth, air, water, and fire) 
had its origin in the mind of Empedocles about four hundred and forty 
years before the birth of Christ, and held sway for many centuries. Every 
one knows today that neither earth nor air, water nor fire is an element. 
Earth is the most complex of all, for it can be separated into many chemical 
compounds, whose natures vary according to the locality from which the 
soil has been taken. From air can be obtained a number of simple gases, 
among them nitrogen, oxygen, and argon. Water, also, can be easily 
decomposed into the two gaseous ele- 
ments, oxygen and hydrogen; and fire, 
far from being an element, consists of 
the incandescent gases or glowing 
embers of the fuel which is being 
burned. Simple as these facts may 
seem to the modern mind, the world’s 
best intellects once debated them and 
established them. During the cen- 
turies, man’s conception of what con- 
stitutes a chemical element has under- 
gone many other changes, which were 
ably discussed by the late B. N. Men- 
schutkin in the Journal of Chemical 
Education for February, 1937 (82). 

The story of the “defunct elements,” 
those short-lived “elements” which 
were later found to be complex, is 
most interesting, but the present nar- 
rative will be confined to the simple 
substances now recognized by chemists, 
siderably more than a hundred in number, have been described in a fasci- 
nating article by the late Charles Baskerville (2). 

The chemical elements which were undoubtedly known to the ancient 
world are the metals: gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, tin, and mercury, and 
the non-metals: sulfur and carbon. The ancient Jews, as one learns from 
the Old Testament, were certainly acquainted with the first four of these 
metals, and probably with the first six. The ancient Hindus used them 
also, for Sir Praphulla Chandra R4y quotes from the Charaka: “Gold 
and the five metals . . . silver, copper, lead, tin, and iron” (3). 



Pliny the Elder, 23-79 A.D. 

Roman philosopher. Author of a 
“Natural History” in 37 books, in 
which he discussed the astronomy, 
geology, zoology, botany, agriculture, 
mineralogy, and medicine of his time. 

The curious false elements, con- 



4 Discovery of the Elements 

Ancient Metals 

Gold ornaments have been found in Egyptian tombs of the prehistoric 
stone age, and the Egyptian goldsmiths of the earliest dynasties were 
skilful artisans. The metal was used as a medium of exchange in the days 
of Abraham, and is mentioned in Exodus, Deuteronomy, the First Book of 
Kings, Job, the Psalms, the Proverbs, Isaiah, Lamentations, Haggai, and 
Zechariah (4). Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23-79) said that grains of gold were 
found in the stream-beds of the Tagus in Spain, the Po in Italy, the Hebrus 
in Thracia, the Pactolus in Asia Minor, and the Ganges in India (5). In 
the second century before Christ, a cupellation process was used for refining 
the metal, and in Pliny's time the mercury process was well known (6). 



From Biringuccio's *' Pirotechnia ” 

An Assay Furnace, 1540 

Vitruvius, who lived in the reign of Augustus, mentioned the use of 
mercury to recover finely divided gold. “When gold has been woven into a 
garment,” said he, “and the garment becomes worn out with age so that 
it is no longer respectable to use, the pieces of cloth are put into earthern 
pots, and burned up over a fire. The ashes are then thrown into water and 
quicksilver added thereto. This attracts all the bits of gold, and makes 
them combine with itself. The water is then poured off, and emptied into a 
doth and squeezed in the hands, whereupon the quicksilver, being a liquid, 
escapes through the loose texture of the cloth, but the gold, which has been 
brought together by the squeezing, is found inside in a pure state” (47). 

Silver, since it rardy occurs uncombined, did not come into use as early 
as did gold (29 ) . In Egypt between the thirtieth and fifteenth centuries be- 
fore Christ, it was rarer and more costly than gold. It must have been 
used as a medium of exchange long before it was coined, for it is rdated in 
Genesis that when Abraham purchased a burial place for Sarah he weighed 


Silver 


5 


out the silver in the presence of witnesses (7). Jagnaux states that when 
the Phoenicians made their first voyage to Spain they found more silver 
than their ships could carry, and that, for this reason, they weighted their 
wooden anchors with silver instead of lead (8). When the Spaniards 
conquered Peru they found many silver utensils that had been made by 
the ancient inhabitants (9), (28). 

In his “Natural and Moral History of the Indies,” Father Jos6 de Acosta 
wrote in 1590: “The Creator hath furnished the West Indies with so 
great a treasure of silver, as all that which we reade of in antient Histories 
and that which is spoken of the mines of Spaine, and other provinces, is 
not comparable to that we see in those partes — The maner to purge 
and refine siluer (sic) which the Indians have vsed was by melting, in dis- 
solving this masse of mettall by fire, which casts the earthly drosse aparte, 
and by his force separates silver from lead, tinne from copper, and other 
mettalls mixt. 

“To this end,” continued Father de Acosta, “they did build small 
furnaces in places whereas the wind did commonly blow, and with wood 
and cole made their refining, the which furnaces in Peru they call huayras. 
Since the Spaniards entred, besides this manner of refining which they vse 
to this day, they likewise refine silver with qvick-silver, and draw more by 
this means then (sic) in refining it by fire. For there is some kind of silver 
mettal found which can by no means be purged and refined by fire, but 
onely with quicksilver. . (45). 

According to Father de Acosta, “the chief places of the Indies from 
which they draw silver are New Spaine [Mexico] and Peru; but the mines 
of Peru farre surpasse the rest ; and amongst all others of the worlde, those 
of Potosi [now in Bolivia]” (45). “At this day,” he said, “the most vsuall 
maner of refining in Potosi is by quickesilver, as also in the mines of 
Zacatecas, and others of New Spaine. There were in old time, vpon the 
sides and toppes of Potosi, above six thousand Huayras , which are small 
furnaces where they melt their mettall, the which were placed like lightes 
(a pleasant sight to behold by night) casting a light a farre off like a flame of 
fire — But at this day there are not above two thousand. . ” (45). 

Of the assay-masters, Father de Acosta said, “Their ballaunce and 
weights are so delicate, and their grairies so small, as they cannot take 
them vppe with the hand, but with a small paire of pincers: and this 
triall they make by candle light, that no ayre might moove the ballance. 
For of this little the price of the whole barre dependeth” (45). 

In the seventeenth century, Father Alvaro Alonso Barba of Potosi said 
that some of the mines there had been worked by the Incas and that, since 
the coming of the Spaniards, the wealth of this hill had been distributed to 
all parts of the world (46). 

Copper, in the opinion of Berthelot, has been mined for at least five 




J. B. S colin, sculp. 

Frontispiece to 1733 French Edition of Barba’s “Art of the Metals” 

The poem mentions that France used to be rich in precious metals, and ques- 
tions the necessity of searching for them in the New World. 

Pourquoi de l’Oc^an courir les vastes bords. 

France, ne trouvez vo! de l'Or qu’au nouveau Monde. 

En M&taux precieux autrefois si teconde, 

N'avez vous pas toujours vos immenses Tr6sors. 



Copper and Iron 


7 


thousand years. He found by analysis that the most ancient Egyptian 
articles were made of pure copper rather than of its alloys (10), (27). 
“Two vessels of fine copper, precious as gold” were mentioned by the 
prophet Ezra (11). This metal is found in the free state in Egypt, the 
Lake Superior region of North America, and in many other parts of the 
world, and can be obtained from malachite ore by a simple process. 

Knives, axes, spear heads, chisels, and bracelets of this metal have been 
found in Indian mounds in Wisconsin, Illinois, and neighboring states. 
Indian tools and excavations for working the copper veins have been dis- 
covered in the Ontonagon region of northern Michigan (39). Much of the 
copper worked by the aborigines came from Isle Roy ale in Lake Superior 

(40) . 

The pre-Columbian Indians of La Tolita on the Esmeraldas coast of 
Ecuador made small axes, bells, sewing needles, and filigree work by hot- 
hammering native copper. Paul Bergs0e of Copenhagen has made a 
thorough study of the gold, platinum, and copper artifacts of this region 

(41) . 

Arriving at last in the fabled Quivira (now part of Kansas) after his 
remarkable journey from Compostela, Mexico, in search of the gold and 
silver treasures described by his false guide “the Turk,” Don Francisco 
V&zquez de Coronado wrote King Charles V on October 20, 1541, that 
“the natives there gave me a piece of copper that an Indian chief wore 
suspended from his neck. I am sending it to the viceroy of New Spain, 
for I have not seen any other metal in this region except this and some 
copper jingle bells which I am forwarding to him” (42). In his treatise on 
the Coronado expedition, George Parker Winship stated that Indian traders 
used to carry pieces of copper from the mines on the shores of Lake Supe- 
rior, from tribe to tribe, as far east as the Atlantic Ocean and as far west as 
the Rocky Mountains (43). 

In describing his voyage to northern Virginia with Sir Walter Raleigh, 
John Brereton wrote in 1602 that he had seen Indians wearing elaborate 
chains, earrings, and collars of copper, and that some of their arrow heads 
and skull-shaped drinking cups were made of it (44). 

Iron articles were probably made by the Egyptians twenty-five or 
thirty centuries before Christ, but because the metal is so readily corroded, 
iron objects of great antiquity are much rarer than similar ones made of 
gold, silver, or copper (25). Smelting furnaces for iron were used in ancient 
times, but the exact nature of the process is not known. The metal 
must have been in common use in Pliny's day, for he wrote (12 ) : 

It is by the aid of iron that we construct houses, cleave rocks, and 
perform so many other useful offices of life. But it is with iron also 
that wars, murders, and robberies are effected, and this* not only hand 
to hand, but from a distance even, by the aid of weapons and winged 



& Discovery of the Elements 

weapons, now launched from engines, now hurled by the human arm, 
and now furnished with feathery wings. This last I regard as the most 
criminal artifice that has been devised by the human mind; for, as if 
to bring death upon man with still greater rapidity, we have given 
wings to iron and taught it to fly. Let us, therefore, acquit Nature of 

a charge that belongs to man himself Nature, in conformity 

with her usual benevolence, has limited the power of iron by inflicting 
upon it the punishment of rust; and has thus displayed her usual 
foresight in rendering nothing in existence more perishable than the 
substance which brings the greatest dangers upon perishable mortality. 

Of all the ancient allusions to this metal, the Biblical ones are the most 
interesting. Who can forget Job’s eloquent words: “Oh, that my words 
were now written ! Oh, that they were printed in a book! That they were 

graven with an iron pen ” (13). In Deuteronomy one may read with 

surprise of Og, that giant king of Bashan who slept in an iron bed six feet 
wide and thirteen and one-half feet long (4X9 cubits)! (14). This “bed” 
was probably a sarcophagus (37), (33), or possibly a natural rock formation 
of black basait (48). 



From Biritt guccio’s " PiroUchnin ° 

Mercury Stills, 1640 


G. W. Wainwright regards some iron beads which he found at Gerzah, 
Egypt, about fifty miles south of Cairo, as the most ancient pieces of 
iron known. They date back to 3500 B.C. or earlier. Since they con- 
tain 7.5 per cent of nickel, they must have been made from meteoric 
material (77). Primitive tribes often used meteoric iron for weapons 
and tools, and, because of its celestial origin, regarded it with great rev- 
erence. Under the title “Our Stone-pelted Planet/" H. H. Nininger 
has published a scholarly and entertaining history of the most famous 
meteorites (7S)< 





Iron, Lead, and Tin 


9 


The earliest known finds of smelted iron are from Tell Asmai, Meso- 
potamia, and Tall Chagar Bazaar in North Syria. One such specimen 
cannot have been made later than 2700 B.C. and may have been produced 
as early as 3000 B.C. Since it contains no nickel, it cannot be of meteoric 
origin (79). Although the Hittites developed skill in smelting iron, they 
kept the process secret. After the fall of their Empire shortly before 1200 
B.C., the iron workers were dispersed and the true Iron Age dawned in the 
Near East. About two centuries later, according to H. H. Coghlan, this 
craft reached Europe (79). 

Many Negro tribes of Africa have worked iron for centuries. In his 
“Mining and Metallurgy in Negro Africa, ” Walter Cline states that the 
iron and slag found in the earliest deposits at Zimbabwe give evidence that 
iron must have been smelted in southeast Africa at least as early as the 
eighth century A.D. and that by that time the “iron age” in this locality 
was well advanced (80). According to A. F. Cronstedt, the process of 
making osmund iron was known to the Eskimos, Yakuts, and Ostiaks of 
vSiberia (81). 

Lead ores are widely distributed in Nature, and are easily smelted. 
The Babylonians engraved inscriptions on thin plates of metallic lead 
(10), and references to this metal are also found in Exodus, Numbers, and 
Jeremiah. The Romans used it extensively for water-pipes, writing-tab* 
lets, and coins. Unfortunately, they also used it for cooking utensils, 
and lead poisoning was an all-too-frequent result. A few very small lead 
nuggets, some of which are believed to be of pre-Columbian origin, have 
been found in Peru, Yucatan, and Guatemala (41). 

Although tin bronzes were made thirty centuries before Christ, it is not 
certain that metallic tin was known to the ancients. The prophet Ezekiel 
mentioned it in the following passage: “Tarshish was thy merchant by 
reason of the multitude of all kind of riches; with silver, iron, tin and lead, 
they traded in thy fairs” (15). 

Since cassiterite is the only important ore of tin, it must have been the 
earliest source of the metal. Although the Cassiterides, or tin islands, 
mentioned by classical writers were usually supposed to have been named 
for the ore, cassiterite may possibly have been named for the islands, just 
as copper was named for Cyprus and bronze for Brundisium (Brindisi, 
Italy) (62). In speaking of mirrors, Pliny the Elder stated that “the best 
known to our forefathers were made at Brundisium from a mixture of cop- 
per and stagnum” (63). 

The composition of Peruvian bronze, according to Hiram Bingham, was 
not accidental. Pure tin which had evidently been prepared for use in 
casting was found at Machu Picchu, the mountain citadel of the Incas. 
The ancient inhabitants of this fortress were highly skilled metallurgists 
who made bronze implements of varying composition according to the 



10 Discovery of the Elements 

purposes for which they were to be used. No artifacts of pure tin were 
found there ( 64 ). 

In his “ ‘Ancient Egyptian Materials and Industries,” A. Lucas states that, 
although tin ore has not been found in Egypt, the earliest known arti- 
facts of this metal, apart from bronze, are a ring and a pilgrim bottle from 
Egyptian tombs of the eighteenth dynasty (1580 B.C. to 1350 B.C.) ( 65 ). 

Homer's “Iliad" relates how Hephaistos, the lame god of fire, made a 
shield for Achilles: “And he threw bronze that weareth not into the fire, 
and tin and precious gold and silver — ” Among the many decorations 
on the shield was a vineyard scene in gold and silver with a fence of tin and 

a herd of cattle, “and 
the kine were fashioned 

of gold and tin " The 

greaves were of “pliant 
tin” ( 66 ). This may 
have been a tin alloy, 
however, rather than the 
pure metal ( 62 ). 

Herodotus (484-425 
B.C.) said in his “His- 
tory" that he did not 
know of any “islands 
called the Cassiterides 
whence the tin comes 

which we use Though 

I have taken great pains, 
I have never been able to 
Woodcut Showing Distillation of Sulfur in 1557 get an assurance from an 

eye-witness that there is 

any sea on the further side of Europe. Nevertheless, tin and amber do 
certainly come to us from the ends of the earth” ( 67 ). 

In his valuable book entitled “The Cornish Miner,” A. K. H. Jenkin 
mentions some excavations made in 1925 at the famous castle of Chun, 
near St. Just, which dates back to 300 to 200 B.C. The slag found in the 
small smelting-pits there contained tin. Thus the Cornish tin industry 
must be more than two thousand years old. The earliest known charter 
of the Cornish stannaries is dated 1201 ( 68 ). In Book V of his “Commen- 
taries on the Gallic War,” Julius Caesar mentioned the production of tin in 
the midland regions of Britain ( 69 ). 

In the first century of the present era, the Latins referred to tin as 
“plumbum album” to distinguish it from lead, which they called “plumbum 
nigrum” ( 16 ). Pliny and Dioscorides mentioned the use of tin coatings 
to prevent corrosion of copper vessels ( 17 ). 



Tin and Mercury 


11 


When Hernando Cortes arrived in Mexico, tin from a mine in Taxco was 
already in circulation as money { 40 ), { 70 ). “Some small pieces of it,” said 
Cortes, “were found among the natives of a province called Tachco [Tasco, 
or Taxco], in the form of very thin coins; and continuing my search I dis- 
covered that in that province and many others this was used as money; 
I further learned that it was mined in the province of Tachco, twenty-six 
leagues from this city [Temixtitan]” (71). 

Mercury was known to the ancient Chinese and Hindus, and has been 
found in Egyptian tombs dating back to 1500 or 1600 B.C. { 10 ). Dios- 
corides mentioned its preparation from cinnabar { 18 ), while Pliny gave a 
method of purifying it by squeezing it through leather, and stated that it is 
poisonous { 6 ). Earle R. Caley has shown by quotations from Aristotle, 
Theophrastus, Dioscorides, Pliny the Elder, Vitruvius, and the Leyden 



From Biringuccio's ** Pirotechnia ” 
Manufacture of Wood Charcoal 


Papyrus of the third century A.D. that mercury has been known much 
longer than most persons realize. He states that cinnabar was probably 
the only mercury compound known to the ancients and that they used it 
both as a pigment and as a source of the metal { 49 ). In his “Metallurgie 
Chemistry,” C. E. Gellert (1713-1795) stated that “The only ore of mer- 
cury hitherto known is native cinnabar” { 50 ). The most ancient specimen 
of quicksilver known is probably that which H. Schliemann found in a 
little cocoanut-shaped amulet in an Egyptian tomb at Kurna dating from 
the fifteenth or sixteenth century B.C. { 51 ), { 52 ) . 

Theophrastus, a disciple of Plato and successor to Aristotle, described 
quicksilver as a useful substance “obtained from native Cinnabar, rubbed 
with Vinegar in a brass Mortar with a brass Pestle” { 53 ), { 54 ), (55), 

In the first century A.D., Dioscorides Pedanius of Anazarbus, Cilicia, 



12 


Discovery of the Elements 


gave the following process for preparing metallic mercury: ‘‘Putting an 
iron spoon having Cinnabaris in an earthen pot, they cover the Cup, dawb- 
ing it about with clay, then they make a fire under with coals; and ye soot 
that sticks to ye pot, being scraped off & cooled, becomes Hydrargyrum 
[mercury]. It is found also in ye place where Silver is melted, standing 
together by drops on ye roofs. And some say that Hydrargyrum is found 
by itself in ye mines. But it is kept in glassen, or leaden, or tinnen, or 
silver vessels, for it eats through all other matter, and makes it run out” 

(IS), (56). 

The Chinese alchemist Ko Hung (281-361 A.D.) wrote in the Pao Pu 
Tzu, “Many do not even know that mercury comes out of cinnabar (tan 
sha). When told, they still refuse to believe it, saying that cinnabar is 
red, and how can it produce a white substance? They also say that cinna- 
bar is a stone — that stones when heated turn to ashes : and how then can 
anything else be expected of tan sha?” (57). 

J. M. Hoppensack stated in 1795 that the mercury mines of Almad£n 
had been worked for at least 2287 years and that cinnabar from them was 
sent to ancient Rome in the form of powder or sand (58). A. de Galvez- 
Canero believes that the Spanish mercury mines have been worked since 
the third or fourth century B.C. (28). 

In his “Natural and Moral History of the Indies,’ ’ Father Jos£ de 
Acosta said that the Incas labored long in the Peruvian mercury mines 
without knowing what quicksilver was, seeking only cinnabar, or vermilion, 
to use as war paint (59). The Spaniards discovered the mercury mines of 
Huancavelica in 1566-67. When Pedro Fernindes de Velasco demon- 
strated his cold amalgamation process in 1570 to the Viceroy, the latter 
offered him suitable reward, ordered him to make the secret known at 
Potosf (Bolivia), and added that the most important wedding in the world 
was about to take place: the marriage of Mount Potosi (silver) to Mount 
Huancavelica (mercury) (60). A description of the Spanish and the 
Peruvian quicksilver mines was published in the American Journal oj 
Science for 1868 (61). 


Ancient Non-Metals 

Since sulfur and carbon both occur uncombined in many parts of the 
world they must certainly have been known to all the ancient peoples. 
After the killing of the wooers in Book XXII of Homer’s ‘'Odyssey/’ 
Odysseus called to Eurycleia, “Bring sulphur, old nurse, that cleanses all 
pollution and bring me fire, that I may purify the house with sulphur” (72). 
Pliny described the Italian and Sicilian deposits in great detail, mention- 
ing the use Of block sulfur for medicinal purposes, the bleaching of cloth with 
sulfur vapor, and the manufacture of sulfur matches and lamp-wicks (19). 
(73). Georgius Agricola (26) stated that these matches could be ignited by 



Sulfur 


13 




friction on stone and used for lighting candles and dry wood. He also left 
no doubt as to his opinion of gunpowder when he said: “Sulfur is also 
made to enter into that powder — execrable invention — which hurls iron, 
brass, or stone instruments of war of a new kind” ( 20 ). 

It is difficult for the modern chemist to understand the early literature 
of sulfur, for the name was incorrectly used to designate all combustible 
substances. In the eighth century, Geber believed that the metals were 
compounds of sulfur and mercury ; and hence these two elements came to 
have great significance for the alchemists. Abu Mansur mentioned the 
use of the former as an antidote for various kinds of metallic poisoning, and 
Pseudo-Geber told how to prepare milk of sulfur by adding vinegar to 
alkaline sulfur solutions 

(34). Some scholars re- ^ J 

gard the Latin work “In- Jw 

vention of Verity, or Per- TJR 
fection,” as a translation . Wjm 
of an unknown Arabic 
treatise by Geber (Abu /WJHf 

Musa Jabir ibn Hayyan), JjjlW 

who lived in the eighth I 

century A.D. Professor 
Julius Ruska believes, 
however, that Geber ^ 

(Jabir) and Pseudo-Geber ^ ^ 

(the author of the “Inven- 
tion of Verity”) must have 

been separated by five ,, r> , ^ , , . 

centimes of time (35). Georgius AgriC0LA( 1494 . 1555 

The sulfur from which German metallurgist . Author of .. De Re MtUU . 
Cortes and his daring con- lica,” a famous Latin treatise on mining and metal - 

auistadores made their lur 8y> which has been translated into English by 
quisiaaores maae tneir Ex . president and the late Mrs Herbert Hoover. 

first gunpowder was ob- 
tained, so he said, from the rumbling, smoking crater of Mount Popocate- 
petl (70). In a letter to Charles V, written from Temixtitan on October 
15, 1524, he said, “As for sulphur, I have spoken to Your Majesty of that 
mountain in the province of Mexico which smokes! A Spaniard [Francisco 
Montafio] descended by means of a rope, seventy or eighty fathoms, and 
obtained a sufficient quantity to last us in our need; but henceforward 
there will be no necessity of going to this trouble because it is dangerous 
and I shall always write to obtain these things from Spain” (76). 

In 1759 Count Vincenzo Masini (1689-1762) of Cesena, Italy, published 
a patriotic poem on sulfur, in which he described its extraction, purification, 
and uses. Signor Gino Testi has published extracts from this poem, with 



14 


Discovery of the Elements 


explanatory notes (74). In eloquent Italian verses Count Masini gave 
poetic expression to Giorgio Baglivi’s belief that vegetables and animals 
exert an influence over the formation of the metals and the so-called semi- 
metals 

“. . . Within the rocks , among the thorns , 

Between the cliffs , sulfur takes root; 

For gold , silvery copper , iron, and sulfur 
Likewise are plants ' ’ (74)* 

Count Masini also dramatically expressed the relation between sulfur and 
volcanic action. 

The Abbi Lazaro Spallanzani (1729-1799) described the sulfurous fumes 
of Vulcano, and added that “Above these fumes there is a plain, of no great 
extent, which one is at first afraid to venture on, from the subterranean noise 
heard there, and from the shaking of the ground whe n struck with the 
foot. . . . On this plain it was that formerly stood the furnaces in which the 
sulphur of Vulcano was purified. But this useful labour has long since been 
abandoned. . .nor was it abandoned because the quantity of sulphur ob- 
tained was too little. . ., as the vein is very rich and even inexhaustible. 
The real cause why the inhabitants of Lipari no longer continued this work 
was that the ground. . .grows hotter the deeper it is dug into. . ., to which 
is to be added the offensive stench of the sulphureous fumes. . . ” (75). 

In the latter part of the eighteenth century, A. L. Lavoisier and his 
adherents regarded sulfur as an element. As late as 1809, however, Sir 
Humphry Davy believed that it contained oxygen and hydrogen as essen- 
tial constituents and that it was similar in composition to the resins (30), 
(33). Experiments by A. Berthollet, son of C. L. Berthollet, had indicated 
that sulfur contains hydrogen. From his own experiments with Sicilian 
sulfur in 1808, Sir Humphry concluded that “the existence of hydrogen in 
sulphur is fully proved” and that “sulphur, in its common state, is a com- 
pound of small quantities of oxygen and hydrogen with a large quantity of 
a basis that produces the acids of sulphur in combustion. . . ” (30). In 1809 
Gay-Lussac and Thenard thoroughly established the elementary nature of 
sulfur (31), (32). 

By 1810 Davy had changed his views and suspected “a notable propor- 
tion of oxygen in Sicilian sulphur, which is probably owing to the presence 
of oxide of sulphur Considering the manner in which sulphur is pro- 

cured in Sicily, it might be expected to contain oxygen ; when taken from 
the mine, the limestone rock containing it, broken into small fragments, is 
subjected to heat in a kind of kiln; whilst a small portion of the sulphur is 

* " .. .Entro h baize 

Fra dumi> t fra dirupi il zoifo aligna; 

Che piante e vegetahili pur sono 

Veto, Vargento, il tame, ilferro, il zoifo ... ” (74) 



Sulfur and Carbon 


15 


burnt, and ascends into the atmosphere in the form of sulphurous acid gas, 
the greater part of it melts, sinks, and flows out through an opening de- 
signed to give issue. This process I witnessed at the extensive sulphur 
mines in the neighbourhood of Gujenti [Girgenti, or Agrigentum] ; and I 
believe it is generally in use throughout the sulphur districts” ( 30 ). 

When Davy allowed “oxvmuriatic acid gas” (chlorine) to react with 
moist sulfur, he obtained hydrogen chloride and oxygen. When he re- 
peated the experiment, using Sicilian sulfur dried over calcium chloride, 
“no oxygen gas was evolved and not a cubical inch of muriatic [hydro- 
chloric] acid. . .and it was found that between 16 and 17 cubical inches of 
oxymuriatic acid gas [chlorine] had disappeared; the whole of the sulfur 
was sublimed in the gas, and the liquor formed was of a tawny-orange 
colour” [probably sulfur monochloride] ( 30 ). 

Carbon in the forms of charcoal and soot must certainly have been known 
even to prehistoric races, and in Pliny’s time the former was made, much 
as it is today, by heating wood in a pyramid covered with clay to exclude 
the air ( 21 ). According to the “Encyclopaedia Biblica,” the word diamond 
as used in the old Testament probably does not refer to the true diamond 
but more likely to corundum ( 22 ), ( 36 ). The ancient Hindu scriptures, 
the Vedas, the Ramayana, and the Mahabharata, make frequent mention 
of the diamond. As early as 1704 Sir Isaac Newton stated in his “Optics” 
that it must be combustible, and in 1772 Lavoisier found this to be true 
( 23 ). The English chemist, Smithson Tennant, proved in 1797 that it 
consists solely of carbon ( 24 ). 

Literature Cited 

(1) Winkler, C., “Ueber die Entdeckung neuer Elemente im Verlaufe der letzten 
ftinfundzwanzig Jahre," Ber., 30, 13 (Jan., 1897). 

(2) Baskerville, C., '‘The elements: Verified and unverified," Science , N. S., 19, 
88-100 (Jan., 1904). 

(3) RAy, P. C., “History of Hindu Chemistry," 2nd edition, Vol. 1, Chuckervertty, 
Chatterjee and Co., Calcutta, 1904, p. 25. 

(4) Ex., 20:23; Deu., 8:13; I Ki., 20:3; Job, 31:24; Ps., 19:10; Prov., 16:10; 
Isa., 60:17; Lam., 4:1; Hag., 2:8; Zee., 13:9. 

(5) Pliny the Elder, “Natural History," translated by Bostock and Riley, Geo. 
Bell and Sons, London, 1856, Book XXXIII, Chap. 21. 

(6) Ibid., Book XXXIII, Chap. 32. 

(7) Genesis, 23: 16. 

(3) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie," Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, p. 372, 
(9) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry," Vol. 1, Colburn and Bentley, Lon- 
don, 1830, p. 53; E. O. von Lippmann, “Entstehung und Ausbreitung der Al- 
chemie," Springer, Berlin, 1919, pp. 519-30. 

(10) Stillman, J. M., “The Story of Early Chemistry," D. Appleton and Co., New 
York City, 1924, pp. 2-7. 

( 11 ) Ezra, 8: 27. 

(12) Pliny Yhb Elder, “Natural History," ref. (5), Book XXXIV, Chap, 39. 



16 


Discovery of the Elements 


(13) Job, 19: 23-4. 

(14) Deu.. 3:11. 

(15) Eze., 27: 12. 

(16) Pliny the Elder, “Natural History,” ref. (5), Book XXXIV, Chap. 47. 

(17) Ibid ., Book XXXIV, Chap. 48. 

(18) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (8), Vol. 2, p. 366. 

( 19 ) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” ref. ( 9 ), Vol. 1, p. 103; Pliny tiie 
Elder, “Natural History,” ref. (5), Book XXXV, Chap. 50. 

( 20 ) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (£), Vol. I, p. 458. 

(21) Ibid ., Vol. 1, p. 680; Pliny the Elder, “Natural History,” ref. (5), Book XVI, 
Chap. 8. 

(22) Ex., 28: 18; 39: 11; Eze., 28: 13; Jer., 17, 1. 

(23) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (8), Vol. 1, pp. 664-8; Ernst von 
Meyer, “Geschichte der Chemie,” 4th edition, Veit and Co., Leipzig, 1914, p. 371. 

( 24 ) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” ref. ( 9 ), Vol. 2, p. 236. 

(25) Berthelot, P.-E.-M., “Les Origines de TAlchimie,” Steinheil, Paris, 1885, pp. 
227-8. 

( 26 ) Billincer, R. D., “Assaying with Agricola,” J. Chem. Educ., 6, 349-54 (Feb., 
1929). 

( 27 ) Berthelot, P.-E.-M., “La Chimie an Moyen Age,” Vol. 1, Imprimerie Nationalc, 
Paris, 1893, p. 364. 

(28) De GAlvez-Ca^ero, A., “La Metalurgia de la Plata y del Mercurio. Bosquejo 
Hist6rico,” IX Congreso Intemacional de Quimica Pura y Aplicada, Madrid, 
1934, 37 pp. 

( 29 ) Partington, J. R., “Origins and Development of Applied Chemistry,” Long- 
mans, Green and Co., London, 1935, pp. 14-100. 

( 30 ) Davy, J., “The Collected Works of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.,” Smith, Elder and 
Co., London, 1840, Vol. 5, pp. 73, 160-8, 216-20, 310-11. 

(31) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Chemie,” Fr. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 1847, 
Vol. 3, pp. 310-11. 

( 32 ) Gay-Lussac, L.-J. and L.-J. Thenard, “En reponse aux recherches analytiques 
de M. Davy, sur la nature du soufre et du phosphore,” Ann. chim . phys . (1), 73, 
229-53 (Mar. 31, 1810). Read Sept. 18, 1809 

( 33 ) Davy, H., “Sur la nature de certains corps, particulterement des alcaiis, du soufre, 
du phosphore, du carbonc et des acides reputes simples,” ibid ., (1), 73, 5-11 (Jan. 
31, 1810). 

( 34 ) Holmyard, E. J., “The Works of Geber Englished by Richard Russell, 1678,” 
J. M. Dent and Sons, Iyondon and Toronto, 1928, p. 209. 

( 35 ) Bugge, G., “Das Buch der grossen Chemiker,” Verlag Chemie, Berlin, 1929, 
Vol. 1, pp. 18-31, 60-9. Articles on Jabir and Pseudo-Geber by J. Ruska. 

(3$) ChEyne, T, K. and J. S. Black, “Encyclopaedia Biblica,” The Macmillan 
Company, New York, 1899, Vol. 1, columns 1097-8. 

(37) Smith, J. M. and E. J. Goodspeed, “The Bible. An American Translation,” 
University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1931, 418 pp. Translation of Deuteron- 
omy by T. J. Meek. 

(38) Wbek«, M. E., “An exhibit of chemical substances mentioned in the Bible,” J. 
Chem. Educ., 20, 63-76 (Feb., 1943). 

(39) Dana, J. D., “Manual of Mineralogy and Lithology,” John Wiley and Sons, 
New York, 1880, 3rd ed., p. 144. 

( 40 ) Browne, C, A*, “The chemical industries of the American aborigines,” Isis , 23 
(2), 417 (Sept., 1935). 



Literature Cited 


17 


(41) Bergs0e, Paul, “The Gilding Process and the Metallurgy of Copper and Lead 
among the pre-Columbian Indians,” Danmarks Naturvidenskabelige Samfund, 
Copenhagen, 1938, lngeni0rvidenskabelige Skrifter, No. A 46, 56 pp. 

(42) Hammond, G. P. and Agapito Rey, “Narratives of the Coronado Expedition, 
1540-1542,” University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerqufe, 1940, p. 188. 

(42) Winship, G. P., “The Coronado Expedition, 1540-1542,” U. S. Bu. Am. Eth- 
nology, Washington, D. C., 1896, pp. 345, 350, 397, 405, 509, 577, 582. 

(44) Brereton, John, “A Briefe and True Relation of the Discouerie of the North 
Part of Virginia,” George Bishop, London, 1602, p. 9. 

(45) de Acosta, Father Jos£, “Natural and Moral History of the Indies,” The 
Hakluyt Society, London, 1880, Vol. 1, pp. 186-211, 223. 

(46) Barba, A. A., “El Arte de los Metales,” John Wiley and Sons, New York, 1923, 
pp. 67-9. English translation by R. E. Douglass and E. P. Mathewson. 

(47) Morgan, M. H., “Vitruvius. The Ten Books on Architecture,” Harvard 
University Press, Cambridge, 1914, pp. 215-6. 

(48) Isserow, Saul and Hugo Zahnd, “Chemical knowledge in the Old Testament,” 
J. Chem. Educ., 20, 327-35 (July, 1943). 

(49) Caley, E. R., “Mercury and its compounds in ancient times,” ibid., 5, 419-24 
(Apr., 1928). 

(50) Gellert, C. E., “Metallurgic Chemistry,” T. Becket, London, 1776, p. 57. 

(51) von Lippmann, E. O., ref. (9), Vol. 1, pp. 600-07. 

(52) Schelenz, H., “Geschichte der Pharmazie,” J. Springer, Berlin, 1904, p. 41. 

(52) Hill, John, “Theophrastus’s History of Stones,” printed for the author, London, 

1774, 2nd ed., pp. 227-35. 

(54) Kopp, H., ref. (31), Vol. 4, p. 172. 

(55) Martin, Benjamin, “Biographia Philosophica,” W. Owen, London, 1764, pp. 
58-60. Biographical sketch of Theophrastus. 

(56) Gunther, R. T., “The Greek Herbal of Dioscorides,” Oxford University Press, 
Oxford, 1934, pp. 623-6, 638, 648. 

(57) Davis, Tenney L., “Remarks on the value of historical studies,” Report of New 
England Assoc, of Chem. Teachers , May, 1930, p. 5. 

(58) Hoppensack, J. M., “Ueber den Bergbau in Spanien iiberhaupt und der Queck- 
silver-bergbau zu Alrnaden,” Weimar, 1796, 158 pp. Review in Ann. chint . phys., 
(1), 25, 51-60 (1798). 

(59) de Acosta, Father Josfe, ref. (45), Vol. 1, pp. 185, 214-17. English translation 
by Edward Grimston, 1604. 

(60) Ar£valo, Celso, “La Ilistoria Natural en Espana,” Unibn Poligr4fica, Madrid, 
1935, pp. 143-9. 

(61) Hawley, C. E., “Notes on the quicksilver mine of Santa Barbara in Peru,” Am. 
J. Sci ., (2), 45, 5-9 (Jan., 1868); “Notes on the quicksilver mines of Alrnaden, 
Spain,” ibid., (2), 45, 9-13 (1868). 

(62) Saglio, E. and E. Pottier, *‘Dictionnaire des Antiqifites Grecques et Romanies,” 
Librairie Hachette et Cie., Paris, 1877, Vol. 4, pp. 1457-64. Article on Stannum 
by Maurice Besnier. 

(63) Bailey, K. C., “The Elder Pliny’s Chapters on Chemical Subjects,” Edward 
Arnold and Co., London, 1929, Part 1, p. 129. 

(64) Bingham, Hiram, “Machu Picchu, a Citadel of the Incas,” Yale University 
Press, New Haven, Conn., 1930, p. 197. 

(65) Lucas, A., “Ancient Egyptian Materials and Industries,” Edward Arnold and 
Co., London, 1934, 2nd ed., pp. 209-11. 214, 352. 



18 


Discovery of the Elements 


( 66 ) “The Complete Works of Homer,” Modern Library, New York, no date, pp. 350- 
4. The “Iliad,” Book 18. 

(67) Rawlinson, G. and M. Komroff, “The History of Herodotus,” Tudor Publishing 
Co., New York, 1941, p. 188; Book III of the Herodotus History. 

(68) Jenkin, A. K H., “The Cornish Miner,” George Allen and Unwin, Ltd., London, 
1927, 351 pp. 

(69) Lodge, H. C. and F. W. Halsey, “The Best of the World’s Classics,” Funk and 
Wagnalls Co., New York and London, 1909, Vol. 2, p. 65. 

(70) Harrar, N. J., “Sulfur from Popocatepetl,” J. Chem. Educ., 11, 641 (Dec., 1934). 

(71) MacNutt, F. A., “Letters of Cortes,” G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York and 
London, 1908, Vol. 2, p. 204. Letter of Cortes to Charles V, Oct. 15, 1524. 

(72) “The Complete Works of Homer,” ref. (66), pp. 352-3. Book XXII of the 
“Odyssey.” 

(73) Bailey, K. C., ref. (63), Vol. 2, pp. 97-9; Pliny, “Historia Naturalis,” Book 35, 
paragraphs 174-7. 

(74) Trsti, Gino, “La chimica dello zolfo in un poema del 1759,” La Chimica neW 
Industria, nelV Agricoltura, e nella Biologia , 6, 182-5 (May 31, 1930). 

(75) Pinkerton, John, “A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting 
Voyages and Travels in All Parts of the World,” Longman, Hurst, Rees, and 
Orme, London, 1809, Vol. 5, pp. 139-40. L. Spallanzani’s “Travels in the two 
Sicilies.” 

(76) MacNutt, F. A., ref. (71), Vol. 2, p. 205. 

(77) Wainwright, G. A., “The coming of iron,” Antiquity, 10, 5-24 (March, 1936). 

(78) Nininger, H. H., “Our Stone-pelted Planet,” Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston and 
New York, 1933, 237 pp. 

(79) Cogiilan, H. H., “Prehistoric iron prior to the dispersion of the Hittite Empire,” 
Man, 41, 74-80 (July, Aug., 1941). 

(80) Cline, Walter, “Mining and Metallurgy in Negro Africa,” George Banta 
Publishing Co., Menasha, Wis., 1937, pp. 17-23. Chapter on Negro iron-working 
in antiquity. 

(81) Cronstedt, A. F., “Aminnelsetal ofver H. T. Scheffer,” Lars Salvius, Stockholm, 
1760, pp. 15-31. 

(82) Menschutkin, B. N., “Historical development of the conception of chemical 
elements,” J. Chem. Educ., 14, 59-61 (Feb., 1937). 



II. ELEMENTS KNOWN TO THE ALCHEMISTS 


The alchemists never succeeded in making gold from base metals, yet their 
experiments, recorded under a mystical and intentionally obscure terminology , 
gradually revealed metallic arsenic t antimony , and bismuth . Finally , in the 
latter part of the seventeenth century , the pale light of phosphorus began to 
illumine the dark secrets of alchemy and to disclose the steady advance of scien- 
tific chemistry. 


“ . . . .Surely to alchemy this right is due, that it may be compared 
to the husbandman whereof Aesop makes the fable; that, when he 
died, told his sons that he had left unto them gold buried underground 
in his vineyard ; and they digged over all the ground , and gold they 
found none; but by reason of their stirring and digging the mould 
about the roots of their vines, they had a great vintage the year follow- 
ing: so assuredly the search and stir to make gold hath brought 
to light a great number of good and fruitful inventions and 
experiments. . ” (1) 

The part played in ancient civilizations by gold, silver, copper, iron, 
lead, tin, mercury, carbon, and sulfur has already been shown. Certain 



Sixteenth-Century Cartoon on Alchemy 


other elements, although their lineage is not quite so ancient, have never- 
theless had a history that extends far back through the centuries. In this 
group may be mentioned arsenic, antimony, bismuth, and phosphorus; and, 

19 




20 


Discovery of the Elements 


strangely enough, these four simple substances have so many character- 
istics in common that they constitute one of the groups in the system of 
classification now universally used by chemists. Their early history is so 
shrouded in uncertainty that only in the case of phosphorus is it possible 
to assign the honor of discovery definitely to any person. 

Arsenic 

“ For smelter fumes have I been named . 

I am an evil , poisonous smoke . . . 

But when from poison I am freed, 

Thrpugk art and sleight of hand , 

Then can I cure both man and beast , 

From dire disease ofttimes direct them; 

But prepare me correctly , and take great care 
That you faithfully keep watchful guard over me; 

For else am I poison , and poison remain , 

That pierces the heart of many a one.” (36)* 

The so-called “arsenic” of the Greeks and Romans consisted of the 
poisonous sulfides, orpiment and sandarac, mined with heavy loss of 
life by slave labor (2). No one knows who first isolated the metal, but 
this honor is sometimes accredited to Albert the Great (Albertus Magnus, 
1 193-1280), who obtained it by heating orpiment with soap ( 3 ). Paracelsus 
(15), the eccentric and boastful medical alchemist of the sixteenth century, 
mentioned a process for obtaining metallic arsenic, “white like silver,” by 
heating the so-called “arsenic” of the ancients with egg shells (18), Ber- 
thelot believed, however, that metallic arsenic was known much earlier 
than this, for it i$ easily reduced from its ores. Since it sublimes easily, 
and readily forms soft alloys with other metals, and since the arsenic sul- 
fide, realgar, looks very much like the corresponding mercury ore, cinnabar, 
the alchemists regarded arsenic as a kind of quicksilver. The Pseudo- 
Democritus gave tne following method of reducing the ore: “Fix the mer- 
cury obtained from : arsenic (sulfide) or from sandarac, throw it on to copper 
and iron treated with sulfur, and the metal will become white” (5), (27), 
(23). 

Signor Marcello Muccioli published in Archeion an article on the knowl- 
edge of arsenic possessed by the Chinese in about 1600, as exhibited in 
the Pen Ts’ao Kan-Mu (or Kang-mu), a 52-volume encyclopedia on 

* " Mein Nahme heisset HilUen-Rauch/ 

Und bin ein giff tiger boser Schmauch . . . 

Da aber Ich vmier den Gift/ 

Dutch Kunst und reckte Handgriff/ 

So kan Ich Menschen und Vieh curiren/ 

Auss bdser Krdfackheit offtmals fiihren/ 

Dock bereit mit remit und hah gut Acht/ 

Doss du haltst rqU mir gute Wachtj 
Sonst bin Ich Gifft und bmbe Gift/ 

Das manchems Wertz im Leib absticht. * * (36) 



Arsenic 


21 


materia medica ( 37 ). Yoshio Mikami states that this work was printed 
in 1590 and that it was the result of thirty years of scholarly labor by its 
author, Li Shih-chen 
( 38 ). The Chinese were 
thoroughly familiar with 
the poisonous properties 
of arsenic, and knew how 
to test whether or not a 
person had been poisoned 
by it. They used it to 
kill mice in their fields 
and insects in their rice 
plantations. Chinese 
persons were sometimes 
poisoned by drinking 
beverages which had 
stood for some time in 
new tin vessels. The 
author of the Pen Ts’ao 
attributed these cases to 
improper purification of 
tin prepared from min- 
erals containing arsenic 
( 37 ). After making era- 
sures in their manu- 
scripts (which were writ- 
ten on yellow paper), 
ancient Chinese scholars 
covered them neatly with 
a yellow varnish contain- 
ing finely pulverized orpi- 
ment. Most of the orpi- 
ment was used by artists, 
however, as a pigment 
( 37 ). 

In 1649 Johann Schroe- 
der published a pharma- 
copoeia in which he gave 
two methods of obtaining 
metallic arsenic : ( 1) by 

decomposing orpiment, 

arsenious sulfide, with lime and ( 2 ) by reducing arsenious oxide with char- 
coal. The metallic nature of this element was thoroughly established 



Albertus Magnus, 1193-1280 

German Dominican scholar and alchemist who in- 
terpreted Aristotle to the Latin races. Author of 
" De Miner ctiibus .” He alsb contributed to mechanics, 
geography, and biology. 


Discovery of the Elements 


through the researches of J. F. Henckel (1725), Georg Brandt (1733), (2l)> 
J. Browall (1744), and A. G. Monnet (1774) (16). Bishop Johan Browall 
also observed that it, like sulfur, is present, in small amounts at least, in 

most ores and that it sometimes occurs 
in the uncombined state (3), (22). 
J. H. Pott (1692-1777) and Browall 
(1706-1755) reduced white arsenic with 
soap (22). 

Antimony 

“But antimony j like mercury, can 
best be compared to a round circle 
without end,... and the more one 
investigates it, by suitable means, 
the more one discovers in it and 
learns from it; it cannot be mastered, 
in short, by one person alone because 
of the shortness of human life. ,> (58) 

Antimony, like arsenic, was known 
to the ancients, but perhaps only in 

From Peters* 4t Aus pharmazeutischer Vorzcii * the form of its Sulfide, which Oriental 
tn Btld und Wort " 7 

Sbventeenth-Century Ai.chem.stic WOmen of leisure used to use to darken 
Symbol for Arsenic and beautify their eyebrows (4). Ber- 

thelot’s belief that metallic antimony 
was known to the ancient Chaldeans was based on his analysis of a 
most unusual vase that had been brought to the Louvre from the 
ruins of Tello, and which he found to consist of pure metallic antimony 
containing only a trace of 
iron (5), (19). He also 
quoted the following pas- 
sage from Dioscorides: 

4 ‘One roasts this ore (anti- 
monious sulfide) by plac- 
ing it on charcoal and 
heating to incandescence; 
if one continues the roast- 
ing, it changes into lead” 

(5) . Pliny issued the same 
warning in his description 
of the preparation of anti- 
mony medicinals, when he 
said: “But the main thing of all is to observe such a degree of nicety in 
heating it, as not to let it become lead” (4). Hence it is possible that 
the Greeks and Romans, like the Chaldeans, knew how to obtain antimony, 



From Peters' "Aus pharmaseutischer Vorzeit in Bild und Wort" 

Seventeenth-Century Alchbmistic Symbol for 
Antimony 


o=o 




Antimony 


23 


but since they did not have adequate methods of distinguishing between 
metals, they applied the indefinite term “lead” to all those that were 
soft, easily fusible, and black. 

Georgius Agricola, in the sixteenth century a.d., was familiar with 
metallic antimony and an important use of it. “Stibium,” said he in his 
“De natura fossilium,” “when smelted in the crucible and refined, has as 



From N. LeFevre's “ Cours de Chymie 1751 

Calcination of Antimony 

a, the table, b, the mirror, which can be raised or lowered, c, the stone or the slab, 
on which is placed the powdered antimony, d, the adept adjusting the mirror and 
moving the antimony, e, the light focused by the mirror. 

much right to be regarded as a proper metal as is accorded to lead by 
writers. If, when smelted, a certain portion be added to tin, a bookseller’s 
alloy is produced from which the type is made that is used by those who 
print books on paper” (39). 

The most famous of the early monographs on this element is the “Tri- 
umphal Chariot of Antimony,” which first appeared in 1604, in German. 
Johann Tholde, operator of a salt-works in Frankenhausen, Thuringia, the 
editor of this work, claimed that it had been written by a fifteenth-century 


24 Discovery of the Elements 

Benedictine monk, Basilius Valentinus ( 3 ), (6). Since no conclusive evi- 
dence of the existence of this monk has been unearthed, and since the literary 
style of the “Triumphal Chariot” is much too modern for a fifteenth- 
century manuscript, many historians of chemistry have concluded that it 
must have been written in the latter part of the sixteenth century, possibly 
by Tholde himself. Felix Fritz, however, has concluded from comparison 
with the “Haligraphia” and other authentic publications of J. Tholde thal 

he cannot have been the author 
of the “Triumphal Chariot” nor 
of the other writings attributed 
to Basilius (40). 

In 1707 Nicolas L&nery pub- 
lished his famous “Treatise on 
Antimony.” He was born at 
Rouen on November 17, 1645. 
After studying pharmacy there 
under one of his relatives, he went 
to Paris in 1666 to complete his 
education. Dissatisfied with his 
progress under the unsociable but 
scholarly Christophe Glaser, dem- 
onstrator of chemistry at the 
Jardin du Roi, he resolved to tour 
France and learn first-hand from 
the greatest chemists of his day 
(43 ) . Returning to Paris in 1672, 
he lectured to groups of students 
who rebelled against the prevail- 
ing ignorance and prejudice of 
the iatrochemists (41). 

When M.L&nery had to choose 
between the two degrees, Doctor 
of Medicine or Master Apothe- 
cary, he selected the latter be- 
B.-B. de Fontenelle described his 
public laboratory in the Rue Galande as “less a room than a cellar, and 
almost a magic cavern, illumined only by the light of the furnaces; yet the 
influx of people was so great that there was scarcely enough room for 
his operations. Even women, carried along by fashion, had the audacity 
to show themselves at such learned assemblies” (41). 

Students came from all parts of Europe to live at his boarding school, 
“and the rooms of the quarter were filled with half-pensioners, who wished 
at least to eat at his home.” His pharmaceutical preparations had a large 



Basilius Valentinus 

Although the collection of chemical writings 
attributed to the fifteenth-century Benedic- 
tine monk, Basilius Valentinus, contains this 
alleged portrait, there is no conclusive evi- 
dence that such a person ever lived. Al- 
though the Triumphal Chariot of Antimony 
and other writings commonly attributed to 
him are much too modern for the fifteenth 
century, they are nevertheless of great 
historical value. 


cause of its closer relation to chemistry. 


Antimony 


25 


sale, and the profits from his “bismuth magistery,” a cosmetic, were 
sufficient for all the expenses of his household. In 1675 he published his 
famous “Cours de Chymie,” which, unlike most scientific books, sold out 
edition after edition “like a work of romance or satire.” 

When L£mery was received into the Academy of Sciences in 1699, he 
decided to make a thorough analysis of the mineral known as antimony 
[stibnite] in a search for useful medicaments. After reading his paper in 
instalments to the Academy, he finally 
published it in 1707 as the “Treatise 
on Antimony.” “When I resolved to 
study antimony thoroughly in all its 
aspects,” said he, “I believed it proper 
to begin with some reflections on the 
nature of this compound and the 
places where it occurs ; on the names 
which were applied to it, and their 
diversity ; on how to select it ; and on 
its medicinal virtues (41). 

“Antimony,” said L6mery, “is a 
heavy, fragile, black, shining, odorless, 
insipid, and very sulfurous mineral 
crystallizing in laminae or in long 
needles. It occurs near the metals in 
many European mines, in Hungary, 
in Transylvania, in Brittany, in Poi- 
tou, and in Avernia. In Latin it is 
called antimonium or stibium . The 
alchemists, who abound in high- 
sounding names, have called it the 
red lion or wolf, because in the fire it devours the greater part of the metals; 
believing that many metals were derived from it, they have called it the 
root of the metals; because it receives various forms and colors, they have 
sometimes called it Proteus; sometimes sacred lead , or philosophers' lead , 
because they believed that, since this mineral devours many metals, it 
must be related to lead, which combines with many metallic substances (41). 

“Among the merchants,” continued L&nery,' “we find two general 
species of antimony, the unworked mineral and the artificial : the former 
is taken from the mine loaded or mixed with many rock fragments, which 
the artisans call gangue — This kind of antimony is not very common 
at the apothecaries’ shops because it does not sell well — 

“The other kind of antimony,” said L&nery, “is that commonly found 
at the apothecaries’ ;* it is not different from the first except that it has been 
purified from its stony and earthy constituents. To purify it, the anti- 



Nicolas Lemery, M.D., 1645-1715 

French chemist. Author of "Cours 
de Caymie” one of the textbooks that 
Scheele studied, and of a treatise on 
antimony. 



26 


Discovery of the Elements 


mony taken from the mine is melted in vessels or crucibles in the fire, then 
removed by means of a perforated iron ladle to other vessels; the dirt 
which remains on the strainer is thrown away, and when the antimony has 
become cold, the vessels are broken open and removed, and it [the anti- 
mony] is sent to us in loaves as we see it. The antimony from Poitou is the 

handsomest and best, because most carefully purified ” (41). Before 

the discovery of stibnite in France, small specimens of it had been imported 
from Hungary. 

By heating a mixture of crude, pulverized stibnite, saltpeter, and “red 
tartar* 1 to redness in a crucible, L&nery obtained the metal, which fused 
completely, and condensed on cooling to form a massive, shining solid with 
the characteristic stellar structure of antimony on its surface (41). This 
highly specialized investigation led Fontenelle to foresee the great chemical 
monographs of today. “One might learn from this example,” said he, 
“that the study of a single mixture is almost limitless and that each in 
particular might have its own chemist” (41). 

Du Monstier, the editor of Nicolas Le Fevre’s “Cours de Chymie,” was 
more critical of L6tnery’s work. “A treatise that he published on anti- 
mony,” said Du Monstier, “found itself exposed to the criticism of persons 
better informed than he on this mifteral. I have been not a little surprised 
to see with what boldness he gives to sick persons antimony preparations 
which he devises and risks for the first time. One feels nevertheless on 
reading it that he has never seen those of Basil Valentine and of Suchten, 
both Germans whose works are held in high esteem by connoisseurs” (42). 

Paul-Antoine Cap’s biographical sketch of L&nery, written with the 
literary elegance of a French classic, opens with an imaginary word picture 
of L&nery entertaining in his laboratory his cosmopolitan friend Wilhelm 
Homberg. “At the end of the room, opposite the door,” said Cap, “one 
noticed an immense furnace of solid and massive construction, surmounted 
by a basket full of instruments and various kinds of apparatus. Retorts 
and flasks there contended for space with matrasses, siphons, and aludels 
[earthen subliming pots]. Around this monumental furnace were placed 
other portable furnaces and polychrests, with their alembics, refrigerants, 
serpentines, rosaries, athanors, sand baths, and reverberatory furnaces, 
with their domes, their moor’s head stills, and their copper or tin copings. 
In the center of this great room one saw a large table covered with utensils, 
ums, scorifiers, two-stage and three-stage glass alembics, and subliming 
apparatus with long cones arranged in pyramids. A copper lamp sus- 
pended from the ceiling swayed in the air, chemical symbols, arithmetical 
tables, slates streaked with chalk covered the walls of the room, and at each 
corner, hour-glasses of various sizes served for measuring time and regulat- 
ing the duration of experiments. 

“This laboratory,” said Cap, “one could judge at a glance, was not that 




From LaWali's “ Four Thousand Years of Pharmacy *' 


Frontispiece prom Johann Schroeder’s Pharmacopcria, 1646 



28 


Discovery of the Elements 


of a sixteenth-century alchemist. One did not recognize here, by the pecu- 
liarity of their forms, the bizarre ideas conceived by these men on the 
nature of elements and mixtures. One saw none of those emblems, alle- 
gories, and symbolic figures with the aid of which they thought to hide 
from the knowledge of the common man their pretended secrets, already so 
obscure even for the true adepts. Nothing there suggested mystery, 
charlatanism, or occultism; on the contrary, everything bore the stamp of 
laborious study, of useful science; everything bespoke the modest scholar 
who devoted his life, in good faith and unreservedly, to the search for 
truth” (44). 

After the publication of his monograph on antimony, L&nery began to 
suffer from paralytic strokes and apoplexy, which on June 19, 1715, 
brought his life to a close. According to Fontenelle, “most of Europe 
learned chemistry from him, and most of the great chemists, French or 
foreign, have rendered homage to him by their learning. He was a man of 
unceasing industry, knowing only the bedside of his patients, his study, his 
laboratory, and the Academy, and showing that he who wastes no time has 
plenty of it” (41). 


Bismuth 

The Germanisches Museum in Nuremberg has a collection of boxes, 
caskets, chests, and little cupboards decorated in bright colors painted 
over a background of metallic bismuth (28), (45). In his “History of Bis- 
muth from 1400 to 1800,“ the late E. O. von Lippmann stated that one of 
these was made in about 1480 (46). By 1572 this art had developed into a 
craft there, and in 1613 its artisans were incorporated into a guild (47). 
F. Wibel described a wooden casket in the Museum of Useful Arts at Ham- 
burg, made in 1557. Over a chalk background attached with wax or glue, 
it has a metallic surface about one millimeter thick, overlaid with gold or 
amber lacquer. Investigation of this surface proved it to be bismuth. In 
the latter part of the eighteenth century, bismuth painting was superseded 
by a cheaper process in which perfected lacquers were applied directly to 
the wood (47). 

In the middle of the fifteenth century the demand for bismuth increased. 
The early Gutenberg printing presses first used type cut from brass, and 
later, type cast from metals, such as lead, copper, or tin. In about 1450 a 
secret method of casting type from a bismuth alloy came into use (46). 
According to E. O. von Lippmann, the earliest mining publication to men- 
tion bismuth is that of Riilein von Kalbe, Burgomaster of Freiberg, who in 
1505 referred to “Wysmudertz” as something already well known. 

In his “Heaven of the Philosophers,” Paracelsus (1493-1541) made a 
vague allusion to bismuth : 4 ‘Two kinds of Antimony are found : one the 
common black, by which Sol [gold] is purified when liquefied therein. 




~ Courteay Tannty L. Davit 

* 

Johann Kunckbl von L6wenstbrn, 1630-1702 

German chemist, pharmacist, and glass technologist who gave an early 
account of phosphorus. Counselor of Metals under King Charles XI of 
Sweden. 

(The portrait reproduced herewith is the frontispiece of Kunckel’s 
“Ars Vitraria Experimentalis,” published during his lifetime in 1679.) 



30 


Discovery of the Elements 


This has the closest affinity with Saturn [lead]. The other kind is the 
white, which is also called Magnesia and Bismuth. It has great affinity 
with Jupiter [tin], and when mixed with the other Antimony it augments 
Luna [silver ]” (48). 

Georgius Agricola, a contemporary of Paracelsus, described the proper- 
ties of bismuth in much greater detail and told how it was extracted from 
ores mined near Schneeberg in the Saxon-Bohemian Erzgebirge. In his 
book “Bermannus,” Bermannus says to Naevius, “this which just now I 
said we called bisemutum cannot correctly be called plumbum candidum 
(tin) nor nigrum (lead), but is different from both and is a third one” (49). 
In believing it to be a specific metal, different from all others, Agricola 
was far in advance of his age, for the idea that bismuth was a kind of lead 
persisted even into the eighteenth century (7). The miners believed 
that there were three kinds of lead (ordinary lead, tin and bismuth) and 
that bismuth had progressed farthest in its transmutation into silver. 
When they struck a vein of bismuth they said naively and sadly, “Alas, 
we have come too soon” (7). Since they usually found silver below the 
bismuth, they called the latter “tectum argenti” or “roof of silver” (24). 

In his “De re metallica” Agricola gave several methods of obtaining the 
metal by simple liquation of the native bismuth or by reduction with char- 
coal. Pulverized charcoal was placed in a small, dry pit, and a fire of 
beech wood was kindled over it. When the ore was thrown into the fire, 
the molten bismuth dripped out of it into the pit. The solidified cakes 
were later purified in a crucible (24). 

After discussing the prevalent belief that the growth of precious stones 
and metals was governed by the stars, Padre Alvaro Alonso Barba stated in 
1640 in his Arte de los Metales : “But this subordination and application is 
uncertain, as is also the conceit that Mettals are but seven in number, 
whereas it is very probable that in the bowels of the Earth there be more 
sorts than we yet know. A few years ago in the mountains of Sudnos in 
Bohemia was found a Mettal between Tin and Lead, and yet distinct from 
them both: there are but few that know of it, and Tis very possible more 
Mettals also may have escaped the notice of the generality. And if one 
should admit the subordination and resemblance between Mettals and the 
Planets, modem experience, by excellent Teliscopes has discover'd that 
they are more than seven. Gallileo de Galiles [sic!] has written a Treatise 
of the Satelites of Jupiter, where one may find curious observations of the 
number and motion of those new Planets” (50 ) . 

Georgio Baglivi and Father Jos6 de Acosta believed that metals grew like 
plants under the influence of the planets. “Mettalls,” said de Acosta, “are 
(as plants) hidden and buried in the bowels of the earth, which have some 
confotmitie in themselves, in the forme and maner of their production; 
for that wee see and discover even in them branches and, as it were, a bodie. 



Bismuth 


31 


from whence they grow and proceede, which are the greater veines and the 
lesse. . .they are engendered in the bowels of the earth, by the vertue and 
force of the Sunne and other planets, and in long continuance of time they 
increase and multiply after the manner of plants. . .the rough and barren 
earth is as a substance and nutriment for mettalls and that which is fertile 
and better seasoned a nourishment for plants’ 1 (52). 

In the fifth edition of his “Cours de Chymie,” Nicolas L6mery confused 
bismuth with tin. “Bismuth,” said he, “is a Sulphureous Marcassite that 
is found in the Tinn Mines; many do think it is an imperfect Tinn which 
partakes of good store of Arsenick; its pores are disposed in another man- 
ner than those of Tinn, which is evident enough because the Menstruum 
which dissolves Bismuth cannot intirely dissolve Tinn. There is another 
sort of Marcassite, called Zinch, that much resembles Bismuth Mar- 

cassite is nothing else but the excrement of a Metal, or an Earth impreg- 
nated with Metallick parts. The Pewterers do mix Bismuth and Zinch in 
their Tinn to make it found the better” (52). 

In the eleventh edition of this work, Lemery said that older writers be- 
lieved bismuth to be “a natural marcasite or an imperfect tin found in tin 
mines; but the moderns,” said he, “believe with much likelihood that it is a 
regulus of tin prepared artificially by the English; my thought on this sub- 
ject is that there is natural bismuth, but that it is rare, and that that which 
is commonly brought us from England is artificial. However that may be, 
it is certain that excellent bismuth is made with tin, tartar, and saltpetre; 
some also mix arsenic with it” (53). 

Even as late as 1713 the Memoirs of the French Academy contained 
the statement that bismuth is composed of a mineral, crude sulfur, mercury, 
arsenic, and earth; and the pharmacopoeias of that time contained recipes 
for making it (7). Lemery, for example, described the following method 
which he said was used in the English tin mines: “The workmen,” said he, 
“mix this tin with equal parts of tartar and saltpetre. This mixture they 
throw by degrees into crucibles made red hot in a large fire. When this is 
melted, they pour it into greased iron mortars and let it cool. Afterward 
they separate the regulus at the bottom from the scoriae and wash it well. 
This is the tin-glass which may be called the regulus of tin” (13). He 
thought that bismuth was “probably a regulus of tin prepared artificially 
in England in imitation of a rare natural bismuth*” (30). 

Caspar Neumann (1683-1737) clearly recognized bismuth as a specific 
metal (31). “Bismuth,” said he, “is extracted from its own proper ore, 
which is found most plentifully in Saxony, near Schneeberg, and of which 
some quantities are met with also in Bohemia and in England. Many 
have affirmed that it is an artificial composition, and accordingly delivered 
processes for making it; of which processes I tried those which seemed to 
approach the nearest to probability. . By heating “four ounces of 



32 


Discovery of the Elements 


English Tin, two ounces of white Arsenic, one ounce of white Tartar, and 
half an ounce of Nitre, cemented and melted together” he obtained “a 
Regulus, weighing three ounces and three drams, so much resembling 
Bismuth as to be easily mistaken for it by one who had not thoroughly 
examined the appearance of that semi-metal. There are, however, some 
differences in the structure of the two. . . In their intrinsic properties 
they are extremely different: Thus the counterfeit, dissolved in Aqua 
fortis, forms a bluish coagulum, whilst the solution of the natural Bismuth 
continues uniform and limpid; the counterfeit, calcined and mixed with 
sulphur, exhibits nothing of that singular needled structure which the 
natural assumes in the same circumstances. Since therefore it has been 
reported that the Bismuth met with in the shops is an artificial production, 
and since experiment shows that it is capable of being imitated in its ex- 
ternal form though not in its qualities, we ought to be upon our guard 
against such an imposition.” 

The French chemist Jean Hellot noticed that the tin smelters in Cornwall 
added natural bismuth, instead of the ingredients recommended in the 
pharmacopoeias, to make the tin hard and brilliant, and in 1737 he ob- 
tained by fire assay of a cobalt-bismuth ore a button of the latter metal (7). 

In 1753 Claude-Frangois Geoffroy, a son of Claude-Joseph (Geoffroy the 
Younger), made a thorough investigation of bismuth (7), (20). Since this 
metal had not yet been introduced into medicine and was used only by 
pewterers for rendering tin whiter and more sonorous, it had been neglected 
by most chemists. J. H. Pott, however, had investigated it and published 
his “Exercitationes chymicae de Wismutho,” and C.-F. Geoffroy first re- 
peated the experiments of this famous German chemist. Although Pott 
had stated that bismuth loses 3 /s8 of its weight when calcined in an open 
fire, -Geoffroy found that the weight increased instead, and that, after the 
calx had once been formed, no amount of heat caused any further increase. 

Knowing that lead behaved similarly, Geoffroy sought for other points of 
resemblance between the two metals. Although it had long been assumed 
that lead was the only metal suitable for the cupellation of silver and gold, 
an artist had informed Charles-Franoois de Cisternay du Fay in 1727 that, 
if the gold contained certain impurities such as emery it was necessary to 
cupel it with a large quantity of bismuth. Pott and Geoffroy both found 
that bismuth can also be used in the cupellation of silver. Although Pott 
had stated that bismuth is not combustible, Geoffroy saw it bum with its 
characteristic blue flame (54), He found ten points of similarity between 
bismuth and lead but nevertheless distinguished clearly between them and 
closed with the words “In a second Memoir I shall ascertain whether or not 
this analogy holds on treating these two substances with acids and different 
salts” (54). Because of his premature death in 1753, C.-F. Geoffroy was 
unable to complete this second memoir. 



Bismuth 


33 


In his “Elements of the Art of Assaying Metals/ 1 Johann Andreas 
Cramer pointed out the close association of bismuth with arsenic and 
cobalt. “Every ore of Bismuth,” said he, “as is shewn by the chemical 
analysis, is reduced to the State of Ore by Arsenick : For this goes out of it 
by Sublimation. You find in the same Ore that Kind of Earth that gives 
an azure Colour to Glasses, of which we have already spoken in the Article 
of Cobalt. Whence it is evident that the Ore of Bismuth may without 
Impropriety be called Cobalt of Bismuth: The more, because you will 
find in any ore of Bismuth the same Principles as in Cobalt, only in a 



The Alchemist, by D. Teniers ( 1610 - 1690 ) 


different Proportion” (55). This close association of bismuth and cobalt in 
nature made it difficult for early chemists to distinguish between them (55). 

In Cromwell Mortimer’s notes to the second English edition of Cramer’s 
work there is a description of an ore sent from Cornwall which was “so very 
rich of Bismuth that, by only holding a Piece with a Pair of Tongs against a 
clear Fire, the melting Bismuth will run down as soon and as easy as cheese 
will drop in toasting” (55). 

When the Swedish mineralogist J. J. Ferber visited Derbyshire in the 
latter part of the eighteenth century, he found that “Mineralogy in England 
is still in its cradle, and it is not long since the Cornish miners threw away 
the bizmuth with the refuse, as a substance perfectly useless; and they 




34 Discovery of the Elements 

would have remained in the same error had it not been for Dr. Schlosser of 
Amsterdam” (57). 


Phosphorus* 

In the seventeenth century there lived in Hamburg a merchant by the 
name of Hennig Brand (or Brandt), who was apparently the first man ever 
to discover an element. Of course, gold and lead and the other metals 
and non-metals used in ancient civilizations must have been discovered 
by somebody, but these great contributors to human knowledge are as 
unknown today as is that greatest of all inventors — the man who made the 
first wheel. 

Brand was a soldier in his youth, and it is said that later he became 
“an uncouth physician who knew not a word of Latin” ( 8 ). In spite of this 
deficiency he married a wealthy wife, who honored him for his scientific 
attainments. While endeavoring to improve his financial standing, he 
was lured by the spell of alchemy to search for the King of Metals. No one 
knows what led this zealous alchemist to hope that in human urine he 
might find a liquid capable of converting silver into gold, but it is well 
known that his queer experiments made in 1669 produced results that were 
both startling and strangely beautiful. Small wonder that he was delighted 
with the white, waxy substance that glowed so charmingly in his dark 
laboratory. The method of obtaining this light-giving element, which is 
now called phosphorus, Brand kept secret, but the news of the amazing 
discovery soon spread throughout Germany ( 9 ). 

There lived at that time a famous chemist, Johann Kunckel (1630-1702). 
a son of an alchemist in the court of the Duke of Holstein ( 10 ). The 
younger Kunckel studied pharmacy, glass-making, and assaying; worked in 
the Dresden laboratory of John George II, Elector of Saxony; taught 
chemistry in the famous medical school at Wittenberg; and later man- 
aged the glass-works in Berlin belonging to Frederick William, the Elector 
of Brandenburg. His last years were spent in the service of King Charles 
XI of Sweden, who conferred on him the titles, Baron von Lowenstern and 
Counselor of Metals ( 10 ). 

One day Kunckel proudly exhibited to a friend in Hamburg — much as a 
modem chemist might show a specimen of hafnium or rhenium — a phos- 
phorescent substance. To his great surprise, the friend had not only seen 
this substance before, but offered to take Kunckel to the home of the 
medical alchemist, Dr. Brand, to see a still more remarkable substance that 
shines spontaneously in the dark. Brand* they found, had given away 
his entire supply, but he took Kunckel to the home of a friend to see the 
wondrous element. 

* See also “The Supplementary Note on the Discovery of Phosphorus, 0 Part III, pp„ 
41-57. 



Kunckel’s Phosphorus 


35 


Kunckel, in the heat of excitement, wrote immediately to his friend, 
Dr. Johann Daniel Krafft of Dresden. The latter, however, proved to be a 
false friend, for, without replying to Kunckel’s letter, he went immediately 
to Hamburg and bought the secret from Brand for two hundred thalers. 
Just as the transaction was being made, Kunckel arrived on the scene. 
Ail his attempts to learn the secret process failed, but he did find out that 
the new luminous substance, which had come to be known as phosphorus, 
had been obtained from urine (S). 

Kunckel then began experimenting with this fluid, and was finally suc- 
cessful. Like Brand, he refused to reveal the method, giving as his reason 
the fear that dangerous accidents with phosphorus might become frequent. 
According to Homberg, Kunckel' s process was essentially as follows: Fresh 
urine was evaporated nearly to dryness, after which the black residue was 
allowed to putrefy in a cellar for several months. This material was 
heated, gently at first and then strongly, with twice its weight of sand, in 
a retort leading to a receiver containing water. After the volatile and oily 
constituents had distilled over, the 
phosphorus began to settle out in the 
receiver as a white, waxy solid. This 
was the part of the process which 
Kunckel thought too dangerous to 
reveal to the public. To prevent fires 
and explosions, it was necessary to 
remove the flame as soon as the phos- 
phorus began to appear, and to keep 
the receiver closed until it became 
cold (S). 

Kunckel not only prepared phos- 
phorus, but also cast it in molds to 
obtain the stick phosphorus now fa- 
miliar to all chemistry students. He 
also introduced its use as a medicinal, 
and his famous book on the subject 
bears the curious title: ‘Treatise of 
the Phosphorus Mirabilis, and Its 
Wonderful Shining Pills” (10), It is 
pleasant to know that his phosphorus 
researches were not without reward, 
for Duke Johann Friedrich of Han- 
over paid him an annual pension for the rest of his life (9). According to 
Thomas Thomson (11), William Homberg purchased Kunckel’s secret of 
making phosphorus by giving in exchange the ingenious barometer in- 
vented by Otto von Guericke, in which a little man comes to the door of 



Robert Boyle, 1627-1691 

English chemist and physicist 
famous for his researches on gases, his 
air pump, 'His early experiments on the 
mechanical origin of heat, and his 
independent discovery of phosphorus. 
One of the founders of quantitative 
analysis. 


36 Discovery of the Elements 

his house in dry weather and discreetly retires within as soon as the air 
becomes moist (35). 

It would be unfair to conclude this brief account of the discovery of 
phosphorus without mentioning that Robert Boyle, the illustrious English 
pioneer in pneumatic chemistry, also discovered it independently. He 
prepared it by a method somewhat resembling that of Kunckel, but, as 
Boyle himself said, without any previous knowledge of that process. Boyle 
was a man of such high integrity that one cannot doubt the truth of his 
statement. Krafft claimed, however, to have communicated his process 
directly to Boyle (32). Boyle’s assistant, Godfrey Hanckwitz, made phos- 
phorus on quite a large scale, and exported it to Europe (12). One of his 
advertisements reads as follows: “Ambrose Godfrey Hanckwitz, chemist 
in London, Southampton Street, Covent Garden, continues faithfully to 
prepare all sorts of remedies, chemical and galenical .... For the in- 
formation of the curious, he is the only one in London who makes inflam- 
mable phosphorus, black phosphorus, and that made with acid, oil, and 
other varieties. All unadulterated. . . Solid phosphorus, wholesale 50s. 
an ounce, and retail, £3 sterling, the ounce” (14). 

In 1737 a stranger in Paris offered to sell the secret process of making 
phosphorus to the Academy of Sciences. After accepting the offer, the 
French government appointed Jean Hellot chairman of a committee to 
study the process, and his detailed report, published in the Memoirs of the 
Academy for 1737 and later in P.-H. Macquer’s textbook of chemistry, 
made the process access ible to all chemists (12), (34). The Dictionnaire de 
Chymie published in Yverdon, Switzerland, in 1767 states that “as this 
process, up to the present, has been more curious than useful, and as, 
moreover, it is both costly and embarrassing, I have no knowledge what- 
ever that any chemist repeated it then in France except M. Rouelle, who, 
shortly thereafter, opened his course in chemistry, in which he tried to 
make phosphorus in presence of his audience. I was present at his first 
attempt; M. Hellot, who took great interest in this experiment, came also, 
and followed the process throughout its entire duration. We spent the 
night there; this first operation failed, to tell the truth, because of a defect 
in the retort; but in the following years M. Rouelle succeeded a number of 
times in making phosphorus in his course” (29), (31). However, phos- 
phorus is no longer prepared by the unpleasant method described above. 
In 1769 the Swedish scientists Scheele and Gahn (33) found that it is an 
important constituent of bones, and in the following year Scheele succeeded 
in isolating it from them (8), (25), (26), (27). It really is strange that 
phosphorus was discovered so early in the history of chemistry, for the re- 
actions involvedin Brand's method are rather complex, and even today this 
dement is not isolated with ease. 




Courtesy Tenney L. Davis 

Guillaume-Francois Rouellb 
1703-1770 

Parisian apothecary. Former inspector-general of the pharmacy at 
the City Hospital. Demonstrator in chemistry at the Royal Botanical 
Garden. Member of the Royal Academies of Science of Paris and Stock- 
holm and of the Electoral Academy of Erfurt. Bom in the village of 
Mathieu two leagues from Caen September 16, 1703, died at Passy Aug. 3, 
1770, (Translated from the French caption on the frame.) 



38 Discovery of the Elements 

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cola’s “De natura fossilium," p. 180 and “Bermanmus," p. 439. 

(40) Buggr, G., “Das Buch der grossen Chemiker," Verlag Chemie, Berlin, 1929, 
Vol. 1, pp. 125-41. Chapter on Basilius Valentinus by Felix Fritz. 

(41) “Eloge de M. Nicolas L6mery,” Hist, de TAcad. des Sciences de Paris, 1715, pp 
73-81; N. L6mbry, “Trattato dell’antimonio. . Gabriel Hertz, Venice, 1732, 
preface and pp. 1-3, 275-6. 

(42) LeFevrb, Nicolas, “Cours de Chymie," J.-N. Leloup, Paris, 1751, 5th edition, 
Vol. h PP- vi-vii.- 

( 43 ) De Milt, Clara, “Christopher Glaser," J. Chbm. Educ., 19, 58-9 (Feb., 1942). 



40 Discovery of the Elements 

(44) Cap, P.-A., “Nicolas Ltaery, Chimiste,” Imprimerie et Fonderie de Fain, Paris, 
1839, pp. 2-3. 

(45) Von Lippmann, E. O., “Abhandlungen und Vortrage zur Geschichte der Natur- 
wissenschaften,” Veit and Co., Leipzig, 1913, Vol. 1, pp. 247-8. 

(46) Von Lippmann, E. O., “Die Geschichte des Wismuts zwischen 1400 und 1800,” 
Julius Springer, Berlin, 1930, 42 pp. 

(47) Von Lippmann, E. O., “Nachtrage zur Geschichte des Wismuts,” Chem. Ztg., 
57, 4 (Jan. 4, 1933). 

(48) Waite, A. E., ref. (18), Vol. 1, p. 8. 

(49) Hoover, H. C. and L. H. Hoover, ref. (24) pp. 1-3. 

(50) Barba, Father A. A., “The Art of the Metals,” S. Mearne, London, 1674, pp. 
29-30, 90-1. 

(51) De Acosta, Father Jos6, “The Natural and Moral History of the Indies,” The 
Hakluyt Society, London, 1880, Vol. 1, pp. 183-4. English translation by Ed- 
ward Grimston, 1604. 

(52) L£mery, N., “A Course of Chymistry,” Walter Kettilby, London, 1686, 2nd 
English edition from the 5th French, pp. 101-2. 

(53) L£mery, N., “Cours de Chymie,” Theodore Haak, Leyden, 1716, 11th edition, 
pp. 136-7. 

(54) Gkoffroy, C.-F. (Geoffroy, fils), “Analyse chimique du bismuth, de laquelle il 
r£sulte une analogic entre le plomb et ce semimetal,” Mem. de VAcad. Roy. des 
Sciences de Paris , 1753, pp. 296-312; Hist, de VAcad. Roy., 1753, pp. 190-94. 

(55) Cramer, J. A., “Elements of the Art of Assaying Metals,” L. Davis and C. 
Reymers, London, 1764, 2nd edition, pp. 161-2. 

(56) Baum£, A., “Chymie Experimentale et Raisonnee,” P.-F. Didot le jeune, Paris, 
1773, Vol. 2, pp. 371-2. 

(57) Pinkerton, John, “A general collection of the best and most interesting voyages 
and travels,” Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, London, 1808, Vol. 2, p. 484. 
J. J. Ferber’s “Essay on the oryctography of Derbyshire.” 

(58) Basilius Valentinus, ref. (36), part 2, p. 314. 




m. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE ON THE DISCOVERY OF 
PHOSPHORUS* 


Although most accounts of the discovery of phosphorus are based mainly on 
the writings of Kunckel von Lowenstern and record the events essentially as they 
have just been described, other early records present a somewhat different story . 
In 1902 Hermann Peters , a famous German historian of chemistry and phar- 
macy , made a thorough study of the autograph letters of Brand, Krafft , Kunckel , 
Homberg , G. W. Leibniz , and others which are preserved in the Royal Library 
at Hanover , and found that , although the various accounts differ in many re- 
spects, they all agree on one point: namely, that phosphorus was originally 
discovered by Dr. Hennig Brand of Hamburg. Although most historical records 
present Dr. Brand as an almost mythical character and do not even mention his 
Christian name , he emerges from these rare old letters as a real human being. 


In his correspondence with the Abb£ Nollet, Raimondo di Sangro (1710- 
1771) mentioned the “perpetual lamps” of Saint Augustine (354-430), 
which were sometimes found in sepulchers of the early Christians. Rai- 
mondo di Sangro believed that these lamps contained phosphorus, and 
Gino Testi considered this obscure point in chemical history worthy of 
further investigation (26), (27). 

In his “ History of the match industry” in the Journal of Chemical 
Education, M. F. Crass, Jr., quoted Paracelsus’ recipe for “the separation 
of the elements from watery substances” (28), (29). Paracelsus’ “icicles 
which are the element of fire,” which he apparently obtained by distil- 
lation of urine, may possibly have been elemental phosphorus. If that be 
the case, it is difficult to understand why they aroused so little interest. 

Most authorities agree that the original discoverer of elemental phos- 
phorus was the seventeenth-century alchemist and physician Hennig (or 
Henning) Brand of Hamburg. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) 
was personally acquainted with Brand, corresponded with him regularly 
for at least four years, and wrote a history of the discovery of phosphorus. 
According to this great philosopher and mathematician, Brand was living 
in 1677 at the Michaelisplatz in Hamburg, in the newer part of the city. 
His wife, Frau Margaretha Brand, was proud of his attainments, and the 
dates of her letters show that she lived to enjoy the honors which resulted 
from his epoch-making discovery. A stepson often assisted the doctor in 
his experiments, and there were other children as well. Although Dr. 
Brand was something of a spendthrift and borrower, the family must have 
lived comfortably on their income of 1000 Reichsthalers a year. Visionary 

* Readers who prefer a shorter, yet connected, account of the discovery of the elements 
may omit chapters III, VI, VIII, X, XII, XIII, and XVI. 

41 



Courtesy Fisher Scientific Co. 

The artist who painted this scene, Joseph Wright of Derby (1734-97), called it 
“The Alchymist in search of the philosopher's stone discovers phosphorus and prays 
for the successful conclusion of his operation, as was the custom of the ancient chymi- 
cal astrologers.” It was first exhibited in 1771, and was engraved by William Pether 
in 1775. 


Brand’s Phosphorus 


43 


and impractical though he was, his skill in chemistry won the respect of his 
contemporaries at a time when iatrochemistry held the forefront in medical 
thought. Ambrose Godfrey Hanckwitz once referred to him as “old honest 
Brandt of Hamburg” (15). 

When his alchemical experiments revealed the beautiful light-giving 
element, Brand called it cold fire (“kaltes Feuer ”), or, affectionately, “ mein 
Feuer .” The luminous substance which Kunckel subsequently exhibited 
in Hamburg was “Balduin’s phos- 
phorus,” a phosphorescent calcium 
nitrate which had been prepared by 
distilling a solution of chalk in nitric 
acid (2), (3), (20). Brand’s “cold fire” 
interested Kunckel greatly, and when 
he wrote about it to his friend, Johann 
Daniel Krafft (or Kraft) of Dresden, 
the latter also came to Hamburg. 

They visited Brand and suggested that 
they might be able to sell his secret to 
some royal personage for a high price. 

According to Leibniz, both Kunckel 
and Krafft learned the secret directly 
from Dr. Brand at that time (I), (4). 

The learned Dr. Krafft soon made 
the new substance known far beyond 
the walls of Hamburg as he traveled to 
the Netherlands, to England, and even 
to northern America ( ll dem mitternacht - 
lichen Amerika ”) (4). In an attempt 
to sell the secret process, he exhibited 
the cold fire in the court of the Great 
Elector, Friedrich Wilhelm of Branden- 
burg. On April 24, 1676, at nine in 
the evening, all the candles were ex- 
tinguished while Dr. Krafft performed before a large assembly a number 
of experiments with the “perpetual fire.” However, he did not reveal the 
method by which it had been prepared. * 

In the following spring Dr. Krafft went to the court at Hanover, where 
G. W. Leibniz was serving as librarian and historian under Duke Johann 
Friedrich, and exhibited two little phials that shone like glowworms. 
When Leibniz suggested that a large piece of phosphorus might give enough 
light to illumine an entire room, Dr. Krafft told him that this would be 
impractical because -the process of preparation was too difficult (I). On 
September 15, 1677, Krafft performed some startling experiments with it 



Ambrose Godfrey 

According to I nee (Ref. 15) this 
represents Ambrose Godfrey Hanck- 
witz, but according to Pilcher (Ref. 22) 
it is Hanckwitz's son, Ambrose God- 
frey (1685-1756). Since the portrait 
was made from life in 1738 it must 
represent the son. 


44 Discovery of the Elements 

before Robert Boyle and several other members of the Royal Society. At 
the request of Robert Hooke, Boyle wrote a detailed report of them. After 
the candles had been removed to another room and “the windows closed 
with wooden -shuts,” Krafft’s precious little specimen of phosphorus, of the 
size of two peas, was seen to shine brightly. When Krafft scattered tiny 
bits of it on the carpet, Boyle was delighted “to see how vividly they 
shined . . . And these twinkling sparks, without doing any harm (that we 

took notice of) to the Turky Carpet 
they lay on, continued to shine for a 
good while . . . Mr. Kraft [sic] also 
calling for a sheet of Paper and taking 
some of his stuff upon the tip of his 
finger, writ in large characters . . . 
DOMINI, . . . which . . . shone so 
briskly and lookt so oddly, that the 
sight was extreamly pleasing, having 
ill it a mixture of strangeness, beauty, 
and frightfulness ...” (23). One 
hundred and fifty-seven letters from 
Krafft are still preserved in the library 
at Hanover. 

In July, 1678, Leibniz went to Ham- 
burg and drew up a contract between 
Duke Johann Friedrich and Dr. Hen- 
nig Brand according to which the 
latter was to correspond regularly 
with Leibniz and keep him informed 
about new developments regarding 
the “ cold fire.” The Duke’s part of 
the contract consisted in the promise 
to pay ten thalers a month, with the 
stipulation that sixty thalers, or six 
months’ allowance, would be paid in 
advance for revealing the secret proc- 
esses (“bei Communicirung der Com - 
position und ander bereit habender Curiositaten”) (1). 

Shortly after this Dr. J. J. Becher went to Hamburg and attempted to 
engage Brand for the Duke of Mecklenburg-Giistrow. In this, however, 
he was intercepted by Leibniz, who took Dr. Brand back with him to Han- 
over and advised Duke Johann Friedrich that it would be best to keep him 
at the court or send him to the Harz Mountains until the secret processes 
had been tested. Leibniz thought that Dr. Brand would be able to prepare 
a large quantity of phosphorus in the mountains and that he might perhaps 



Courtesy Mathematics Dept., 
The University of Kansas 


Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz 
1646-1716 

German mathematician, philoso- 
pher, historian, and scientist. Inde- 
pendent discoverer of the differential 
calculus. He was personally ac- 
quainted with Brand and Krafft, and 
wrote a detailed account of the dis- 
covery of phosphorus, including bio- 
graphical sketches of Brand, Krafft, 
Kunckel, and Becher. 


Krafft’s Experiments 


45 


find the philosophers’ stone. Brand did not go to the Harz, however, but 
remained in Hanover for five weeks, preparing a fresh supply of phosphorus 
outside the city and showing Leibniz the secret process according to the 
agreement. The latter also prepared a quantity of phosphorus and sent 
some of it to the physicist Christian Huygens in Paris, who was studying 
the nature of light (2), (5). Thus Leibniz was the fourth person to pre- 
pare the new element (Brand, Krafft, Kunckel, Leibniz) (2). 

Brand, however, was highly dissatisfied with the pay he had received, 
and wrote angry letters to Leibniz claiming that it was insufficient for his 
traveling expenses and the care of his family at home. Frau Margaretha 
Brand also wrote angrily to Leibniz, and her husband berated Krafft for 
inducing him to place confidence in Leibniz instead of in Dr. Becher. He 
also accused Krafft of having received one thousand thalers for the phos- 
phorus in England. 

On December 24, 1678, Dr. Krafft sent this letter to Leibniz, saying, 
“Since you mention having received an angry letter from him [Brand], 
I am sending you mine herewith. You may compare them and see which is 
the prettier” (2). Nevertheless, Leibniz advised the Duke to deal more 
liberally with Dr. Brand, partly out of sympathy, and partly to prevent 
him from selling his secrets to others. 

This tactfulness calmed Brand’s wrath, and in 1679 he planned another 
trip to Hanover to prepare phosphorus on a large scale and reveal his other 
chemical secrets. A weekly salary of ten thalers in addition to board and 
traveling expenses was agreed upon, and a later letter shows that, on this 
second trip, Brand worked for Duke Johann Friedrich two months. The 
last letter from Brand in the Hanover library is dated August 23, 1682, but, 
according to Leibniz, he was still living ten years later (2), (4). Hermann 
Peters thought that possibly other letters from Brand may still exist in 
Hamburg or elsewhere. 

Leibniz communicated Brand’s method of making phosphorite to Count 
Ehrenfried Walter von Tschimhaus (1651-1708) in Paris, and sent him a 
specimen by request. When Tschirnhaus published the Brand- Leibniz 
recipe in the history of the Royal Academy, Colbert recommended him for 
membership in the French Academy of Sciences, and on July 22, 1682, he 
was elected. According to Dr. Peters, this recipe was also published in the 
fifth edition of Nicolas L&nery’s “ Coursde Chymie*' in 1683 (2). 

When Krafft went to England, he exhibited phosphorus in the court of 
Charles II and showed it to the Honorable Robert Boyle (2), (4), (6), {23). 
The great English scientist then prepared it by a slightly different method 
and studied its properties more thoroughly than did any other chemist of 
the seventeenth century (2). 

When Wilhelm Homberg defended Kunckel’s claim to the re-discovery 
of phosphorus after the original secret process had been lost to the world. 



46 


Discovery of the Elements 


Leibniz strove to defend the rights of Dr. Brand and stated emphatically 
that the real discoverer of phosphorus was still living long after Krafft and 
Kunckel had made the element known, and that he used to complain 
bitterly about his false treatment (2). Although Krafft published his 
recipe in 1679, Brand was still living in 1692, and even by 1710 Leibniz 
had heard no report of his death. A. Godfrey Hanckwitz once paid the 
following tribute to the great Hamburg chemist: 

... as all things have their period so has also the vitalis lucula (scin- 
tilla, spark) by approaching age. By (in the case of) this urosophus 
Brandt, it daily lessened and wore off, till at last in the midst of his 
best experiments it e'en quite extinguished. His fine stare fire, which 
through art he produced, remained for his memory longer with us than 
himself .... and shined longer than his flammula vitae , that in time of 
his best occupation did turn and return to its fiery sphere. His ac- 
quaintances and confidents would feign (if wishes would have done 
it) have retarded his decrease to set it farther off . . . (25). 

Robert Hooke and his contemporaries, recalling the animal origin of 
phosphorus, had several “disputes, whether there were any such thing as 
flammula vitae: and it was conceived by some that the experiments of 
phosphorous [sic] plainly proved such & flammula as being extracted either 
immediately out of the blood or mediately out of the urine" (30). 

According to Leibniz, Brand was not secretive, but, on the contrary, 
gave over the process too readily to Krafft and Kunckel in return for some 
little gifts and the promise of larger payments (2), ( 4 ). When Kunckel 
tried out the process at home, his first attempts were unsuccessful. His 
complaining letters to Brand brought him no further information, however, 
for the Hamburg chemist had soon regretted his poor bargain. In the 
meantime Kunckel experimented by a trial-and-error method, and, since 
he had seen the process and was familiar with Brand's distillation ap- 
paratus, he finally succeeded in correcting his own mistake. He then had 
the audacity to claim the discovery for himself (2), (4). 

In a letter to Brand written from Wittenberg on June 25, 1676, Kunckel 
asked him directly for the details of preparation, suggesting that the 
recipe might be worded so obscurely as to be meaningless to others, and 
assuring him that there would be no danger of any one else opening the 
letter. He complained because Brand had given some phosphorus to Krafft 
and the chaplain of the Pest House, and begged him to give no more of 
it to any one else. Kunckel modified the Brand process a little by adding 
sand to the urine before distilling. In June, 1676, he told his friend, 
G. C, Kirchmaier, professor of chemistry at Wittenberg, about the new 
process, and the latter published a paper on it. Whether Kunckel ever 
prepared the new element on a large scale or not is not known, but at the 



Brand’s Process for Phosphorus 47 

end of his history of phosphorus he wrote, “However, I am not making 
it any more, for much harm can come of it” (2), ( 3 ). 

Dr. Hermann Peters concluded from a study of these old letters that 
Kunckel did not re-discover phosphorus, but merely made a little of it by 
Brand’s method, and that, even without Kunckel, phosphorus would have 
remained known to the world through the efforts of Krafft, Leibniz, and 
Boyle (7). 

In 1726 W. Derham published a book entitled “ Philosophical experi- 
ments and observations of the late eminent Dr, Robert Hooke , F.R.S . and 
Geom . Prof. Gresh and other eminent Virtuoso's in his time," in which he 
included a detailed description of Brand’s process of making phosphorus 
(20). Under the title “Phosphoros Elementaris, by Dr. Brandt of Ham- 
burgh,” Derham wrote: 

“Take a Quantity of Urine (not less for one Experiment than 50 or 60 
Pails full) ; let it lie steeping in one or more Tubs, . . .till it putrify and breed 
Worms, as it will do in 14 or 15 Days. Then, in a large Kettle, set some of 
it to boil on a strong Fire, and, as it consumes and evaporates, pour in 
more, and so on, till, at last, the whole Quantity be reduced to a Paste. . . 
and this may be done in two or three Days, if the Fire be well tended, but 
else it may be doing a Fortnight or more. Then take the said Paste, or 
Coal; powder it, and add thereto some fair Water, about 15 Fingers 
high. . . ; and boil them together for 1 /a of an Hour. Then strain the Liquor 
and all through a Woollen Cloth. . .the Liquor that passes must be taken and 
boil’d till it come to a Salt, which it will be in a few Hours. Then take off 
the Caput Mortuum (which you have at any Apothecary’s, being the Re- 
mainder of Aqua Fortis from Vitriol and Salt of Niter) and add a Pound 
thereof to half a Pound of the said Salt, both of them being first finely 
pulverized. And then for 24 Hours steep’d in the most rectify’d Spirit of 
Wine, two or three Fingers high, so as it will become a Kind of Pap. 

Then evaporate all in warm Sand, and there will remain a red, or reddish, 
Salt. Take this Salt, put it into a Retort, and, for the first Hour, begin 
with a small Fire; more the next, a greater the 3d, and more the 4th; and 
then continue it, as high as you can, for 24 Hours. Sometimes, by the 
Force of the Fire, 24 Hours proves enough; for when you see the Recipient 
white, and shining with the Fire, and that there are no more Flashes, or, as 
it were, Blasts of Wind, coming from Time to Tiihe from the Retort, then 
the Work is finished. And you may, with Feather, gather the Fire to- 
gether, or scrape it off with a Knife, where it sticks.” 

Derham said of this phosphorus, “I saw some of it, press’d with a Quill 
that was cut, and it fired Gun-powder about it. Mr. Concle [Kunckel?] 
writ also with it on Paper, and the Letters all shined in the Dark. . .My 
Author says he had ‘once wrapp’d up a Knob in Wax, at Hanover, and it 
being in his Pocket, and he busy near the Fire, the very Heat set it in 



Ambrose Godfrey Hanckwitz 
1660-1741 


In this portrait by George Vertue (1718), the bust of 
Hanckwitz is shown surrounded by his apparatus. At the 
left are shown the furnace and receiver used in the manu- 
facture of phosphorus. The molten product was removed 
with a ladle to the molds in which it was cast into sticks, 
the entire operation being carried out under water. Flam- 
ing phosphorus and the phoenix, emblem of fire and immor- 
tality, figure prominently in the foreground. 



Ambrose Godfrey Hanckwitz 


49 


Flame, and burn’d all his Cloaths, and his Fingers also; for though he 
rubbed them in the Dirt, nothing would quench it, unless he had had 
Water; he was ill for 15 Days, and the Skin came off. . 

The following incident related by Nicolas L&nery illustrates the care- 
lessness of early chemists in handling this dangerously flammable element. 
‘'After some Experiments,' ’ said he, “made one day at my house upon the 
Phosphorus, a little piece of it being left negligently upon the Table in my 
Chamber, the maid making the bed took it up in the bed-clothes she had 
put upon the Table, not seeing the little piece: the person who lay after- 
wards in the bed, waking at night . . . , perceived that the coverlid was on 
fire” (31), 

In his article entitled “The Aerial Noctiluca,” Robert Boyle mentioned 
that “the experienced chymist Mr. Daniel Krafft had, in a visit that he 
purposely made me, shewn me and some of my friends, both his liquid and 
consistent phosphorus. . In return for some information about “un- 
common mercuries, ... he [Krafft] , in requital, contest to me at parting, 
that at least the principal matter of his phosphorus’s was somewhat that 
belonged to the body of man. . (6), (19). On September 30, 1680, 

Boyle’s efforts to prepare the luminous element were crowned with success, 
and two weeks later he deposited his recipe with the secretaries of the Royal 
Society, who, however, did not open it until after he had died in 1691 (7). 

Boyle's assistant, A. G. Hanckwitz or Hanckewitz (1660-1741), was there- 
fore able to develop the process on a commercial scale, improve it, and 
export phosphorus to the continent (8), (9), (17). Hanckwitz had 
been brought over from Germany at an early age by his honored master. 
He later built furnaces and stills in Maiden Lane, and traveled through the 
Netherlands, France, Italy, and Germany. He founded a famous phar- 
maceutical firm in London, and so great was his fame that a letter once 
came to him safely from Berlin addressed simply, “For Mr. Godfrey, 
famous Chymist in London” (15). He was known in England simply by 
the name Ambrose Godfrey, the German surname being reserved for formal 
occasions. 

The letters which constitute his correspondence with Sir Hans Sloane 
from 1721 to 1733 are still preserved in the British Museum (18), and in 
1858 Joseph Ince wrote an interesting biographical sketch of Hanckwitz 
based on correspondence, diaries, and notes (15). According to Caspar 
Neumann, “Mr. Godfrey himself. . .was once in danger of his life from 
[phosphorus], his hand being burnt so terribly that for a time he was out of 
his senses, and for three days lay in exquisite pain, as if his hand had been 
constantly in a fire” (21). In spite of all his dangerous experiments, this 
great disciple of Robert Boyle lived to be an octogenarian. He died on 
January 15, 1741, and was survived by three sons, Boyle, Ambrose, and 
John Godfrey, all of whom shared their father's interest in science. 



50 


Discovery of the Elements 


Hanckwitz kept his recipe for phosphorus a profound secret, and, even 
in the article which he published in 1733, forty or fifty years after leaving 
Boyle's laboratory, gave only an obscure description of the process (8), 
(10). The sons evidently adopted the same policy, for one of them wrote: 

As to the phosphorus made of urine called Kunckel’s, we have it de- 
scribed by the Honourable Mr. Boyle, Mons. Homberg, and others. 
But I shall beg to be excused for not discovering the process how I 

prepare it, or from giving any 
farther light into its production 
than what was done by my 
father, before the Royal Society, 
in the year 1733 (16). 

Yet only two years after this ob- 
scure and vague description of the 
process was published, the aged 
Hanckwitz allowed Dr. J. H. Hampe, 
the court physician, to coax him into 
revealing the secret (8). Not many 
years ago the late Dr. Max Speter 
found this long-lost recipe in an unex- 
pected place. In the published cor- 
respondence of the Counselor of 
Mines, Johann Friedrich Henckel (or 
Henkel) of Freiberg (1679-1744), 
there appears a letter from Dr. Hampe 
written in London on August 29, 
1735 (8), (11). In reply to Henckel's 
Max Speter, 1883-1942 inquiries regarding Hanckwitz and 

Transylvanian inventor and histor- the secret proc ess, Dr. Hampe wrote 
lan of chemistry. Author of many , _ , , . . 

articles on Boerhaave, Geoff roy the that Boyle s famous assistant was 

Elder, Marggraf, Black, and Lavoisier. st}11 lj v i ng but so forgetful because 

Contnbutor to Das Buck der grosscn _ _ . f. . ... 

Chemiker." In 1929 he found the of advanced age that little could be 

Boyle-Hanckwitz recipe for phos- learned from him. Nevertheless, 

phorus, after it had been kept secret „ ... - 

for more than two centuries (25). through diligent questioning of the 

old man, he had succeeded in getting 
the essential details of the phosphorus recipe which Henckel had re- 
quested. Dr. Hampe asked Henckel to write him about any difficulties that 
might arise in his attempts to make phosphorus, in order that the aged 
Hanckwitz might be further questioned if necessary. 

From this letter it appears that "the true key" to the process, which 
consisted in distilling a mixture of solid and liquid excrement, “was, above 
all else, that everything be done under water; especially while pouring 
it into the molds and while cutting it, enough water must always be at 



Hanckwitz's Process for Phosphorus 


51 


hand” ( 8 ), (II). To avoid the necessity of redistillation, or rectification, 
Hanckwitz pressed the phosphorus through leather, being careful to keep it 
under water. In a second letter written on September 9 of the same 




Front Ferchl's Apothcker-KaUndcr for 1932 

Johann Heinrich Linck* 

1675-1736 

Leipzig apothecary who communicated Kunckel's method 
of preparing phosphorus to J. F. Henckel* The “Golden 
Lion” pharmacy was in possession of the Linck family for 
three generations, and their museum of natural history 
and art was known throughout all Germany. 

year, Dr. Hampe gave Henckel further information about the process. 
On November 15 he asked Henckel not to divulge the secret to any one 
else and suggested that they keep each other informed about the experi- 
ments with phosphorus ( 8 ). 

* Courtesy Mr. Arthur Nemayer, Buchdruckerei und Verlag, Mittenwald, Bavaria. 




52 


Discovery of the Elements 


Henckel had learned the details of Kunckel’s method of preparing it as 
early as 1731 from Johann Linck, an apothecary in Leipzig. In his letter 
of May 29, 1731, Linck stated that a better method was being used in 
England by Hanckwitz, but that he did not know the details (8), (21). 

Hanckwitz, however, like his contemporaries, had entirely incorrect 
views as to the chemical nature of phosphorus. “Its principal Contex- 
ture/' said he, “is found to consist of a subtile Acid concentrated by the 
Salt of Urine, and of a fat depurated Oil. . .The Phlogistic Part is so slightly 
connected with the other Principles, that the least Motion, Friction, or 
Warmth, sets it on fire. . .Phosphorus may be called an urinous Soap, as it 
consists of the saline and oleaginous Parts of the Urine. . .In regard to the 
Parts whereof Phosphorus consists, it may be considered as the Soot of a 
deflagrated Oil; and so may every combustible Substance be looked upon 
as a Kind of Phosphorus, as consisting of inflammable Materials. . .Phos- 
phorus is more immediately compounded of a Salt tending to the Nature 
of Sal Ammoniac, of an urinous Salt, of an Acid, and an oily Phlogiston, 
with a subtile Earth. . ." He also stated that glowworms “seem to have 
Phosphorus lodged in their Bodies." Hanckwitz claimed that Kunckel, 
Krafft, and Brand had been able to obtain only “unctuous and opaque" 
phosphorus, whereas his was “hard*, transparent, and glacial" (10). 

Another of the early experimenters with phosphorus was the Abb£ Nol- 
let, who watched Jean Hellot and others demonstrate its properties before 
the French Academy of Sciences in 1737 (32 ) . The procedure was described 
in detail in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences for that year and later 
in P.-J. Macquer’s “Elements of the Theory and Practice of Chymistry.” 
Even in the eighteenth century, chemists had a completely erroneous idea 
of its nature. “Almost all the Chymists," said Macquer, “consider Phos- 
phorus as a substance consisting of the Add of Sea-Salt combined with the 
Phlogiston, in the same manner as Sulphur consists of the Vitriolic Acid 
combined with the Phlogiston" (33 ) . This conception was based, according 
to Macquer, on the presence of salt and phlogiston (carbonaceous matter?) 
in the urine from which phosphorus is prepared and on the fact that phos- 
phoric acid, like hydrochloric, throws down a precipitate with silver nitrate 
(33). 

In 1743 A. S. Marggraf, a student of Henckel, found a much better way 
of preparing this element from urine (12), (13), (14), (24) and, since the 
phosphorus business was no longer as profitable as it had been, he promptly 
published the process. According to Marggraf, the new method had been 
suggested by Henckers statement that, when the “calx of lead" was di- 
gested with sal ammoniac, potassium carbonate, and old urine, and then 
distilled, a good grade of phosphorus could be obtained. According to 
Mielcke, the microcosmic salt, NaNI^HPO^HjO, in the urine was con- 
verted by heating into sodium metaphosphate, NaPOi. In the meantime 



Phosphorus from Plants 


53 


the potassium carbonate and carbon reduced the lead chloride and lead 
oxychloride to lead, after which the carbon and lead reduced the sodium 
metaphosphate to sodium pyrophosphate and phosphorus (12). Dr. 
vSpeter also studied the correspondence between Marggraf and Henckel 
regarding this interesting method of preparing phosphorus. 

Marggraf tried in vain to prepare phosphorus without urine. When he 
used mixtures of various chlorides with “vegetable coals, and even animal 
matters such as oil of hartshorn, human blood, etc.,” all his attempts 
failed. When he separated some microcosmic salt from urine, however, 
mixed the salt with lampblack, and distilled the mixture, “he obtained from 
it a considerable quantity of very fine phosphorus . . . , whence he con- 
cluded that in this Saline matter resides the true Acid that is fit to enter 
into the composition of phosphorus” (33). 

In 1688 Bernhard Albinus (Weiss) mentioned the presence of phosphorus 
in the ash of mustard and cress (34). In 1743 Marggraf prepared it from 
wheat and mustard (35). “In order to demonstrate by experiment,” said 
he, “that the vegetables we enjoy every day or occasionally also contain 
that which is necessary for the production of the phosphorus, I found in 
Albinus’ Dissertation on Phosphorus as well as on page 477 of the cele- 
brated Hofmann’s [Friedrich Hoffmann’s] notes to Poterius that the seeds 
of black and white mustard and of cress yield phosphorus. Since I myself, 
however, still had no experience with it, yet found in Professor Pott’s 
Collegio Mscpto on the first edition of Boerhaave’s Chemistry that wheat, 
rye, and other similar grains yield phosphorus, I made the following experi- 
ments ...” (35). 

When Marggraf distilled the seeds of white and black mustard, garden 
cress, pepper, and wheat, he obtained phosphorus from each of them except 
the pepper. Although Albinus had added sand, Marggraf found this to be 
unnecessary. For the sake of economy, Marggraf used pepper from which 
the essential oil had previously been distilled (35). When he found that 
microcosmic salt could be reduced to phosphorus, he became curious to 
know the source of this salt in human mine. Since he found higher concen- 
trations of microcosmic salt and phosphoric acid in the urine in the summer 
(when people eat more garden products such as mustard and cress), he 
thought it probable that these might be the source of the microcosmic salt 
(36). Although the modem chemist has simple qualitative tests for phos- 
phates, Marggraf and his contemporaries were obliged to carry out the 
much more difficult process of liberating elemental phosphorus in order to 
detect its presence. 

Since plants and animals are able to concentrate phosphorus in their 
tissues, and since these tissues contain their own reducing agents, E. B. R* 
Prideaux does not consider it surprising that physicians and pharmacists 



54 


Discovery of the Elements 


of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries first prepared this element from 
substances of vegetable and animal origin (36). 

Lavoisier said that “Phosphorus is met with in almost all animal sub- 
stances and in some plants which, according to chemical analysis, have an 
animal nature .... The discovery that M. Hassenfratz has made of this 
substance in wood charcoal would make one suspect that it is commoner in 
the vegetable realm than has been thought; this much is certain: that, 
when properly treated, entire families of plants yield it” (37). Apothecary 

J. K. F Meyer of Stettin wrote in 1784 
that he had observed, several years 
previously, a permanent green color in 
the essences he prepared by digesting 
green herbs in copper vessels. He con- 
cluded that phosphates in the leaves 
had reacted with the copper to form 
copper phosphate (38). 

William Lewis stated in 1759 that 
the ash of bones and horn resembles 
chalk and “the earth of the shells of 
sea-fishes ... in being easily soluble in 
the nitrous [nitric], marine, and vege- 
table acids, and not in the vitriolic.’ ' 
The only difference he was able to ob- 
serve between the calcareous earth 
from shells and the bone ash was that 
the latter is “not changeable by fire 
into Lime: How strongly soever the 
earth of Bones and Homs be calcined, 
it continues insipid and gives no mani- 

Swedish chemist, physician, mineralo- impregnation to water (39). 
gist, and agriculturist. T. Bergman's When J. G. Wallerius analyzed eggs, 
predecessor as professor of chemistry, , , , . 

metallurgy, and pharmacy at Upsala. In bone > other animal substances 

his analyses of bone and other animal in 1760, he detected lime, and had a 
substances in 1760, he detected the cal- . « ,, , , , . , . 

cium but not the phosphorus. vague idea that they also contain cer- 

tain other earths. In a footnote to 
this paper in the Neues chemisches Archiv , Crell stated, “Hr. W. did not 
yet know the nature of the animal earth which the unforgettable Scheele 
made known to us: that is, that it consists of lime and phosphoric add” 
(40). In 1769 C. W. Scheele and J. G. Gahn discovered that phosphorus 
is an important constituent of bone. Although some historians of chem- 
istry have attributed this discovery to Gahn or Scheele alone, the late Dr. 
Max Speter proved from Gahn’s own notes that both had a part in it (41). 
In his Chemisches Journal Lorenz von Crell mentioned a rare publication 



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1709-1785 



Phosphorus from Bone 


56 


announcing this discovery. “In the medical commentaries of a society of 
physicians at Edinburgh I found in the first issue of the third part (p. 97 
ff. of the German translation, Altenb. 1776) a report by Hrn. D. Heinrich 
Gahn of Stockholm of how one can obtain a phosphorus from the bones of 
animals and especially from the hartshorn. I searched for a more detailed 
account of this wonderful discovery of Herr Gahn’s. Except for the remark 
in C. W. Scheele’s investigation of fluorspar that it has recently been dis- 
covered that the earth in bones or horns is lime saturated with phosphoric 
acid , all my searching was in vain. In the meantime, since this process of 
working up bones to obtain the phosphorus seemed to me to belong to the 
masterpieces of chemical decomposition, I repeated the experiment ac- 
cording to the instructions in the aforementioned book, and, to my great 
pleasure, found it to be true” (42). The “Heinrich Gahn” mentioned by 
von Crell was probably J. G. Gahn’s brother, Henrik Gahn, assessor in the 
medical School. 

Even to J. G. Gahn and Scheele, phosphorus was a rarity. When Scheele 
first read the English translation of his treatise “On air and fire,” he found 
that Johann Reinhold Forster had translated the word Gran as ounces in- 
stead of grains. “Nine ounces of phosphorus,” said Scheele, “I have never 
yet seen” (43). 

Gahn was a man of broad interests who “often laid aside the Philosophi- 
cal Transactions or his blow-pipe to read aloud, near the sewing- table in 
the next room, now a poem by Kellgren, Franz&i, Fru Lenngren, Leopold, 
or Voltaire, now a comedy by Moli&re or Holberg; or to exhibit a little me- 
chanical or optical masterpiece; or to study the instruments for some 
household art and present a method of improving them” (44). 

During the preparations for his daughter Margareta’s wedding, Gahn 
and his family witnessed a most unusual manifestation of household chemis- 
try. Since the recipe for salting ham with a brine containing sugar and 
saltpeter had been lost, Fru Gahn trusted to her memory, and made the 
mistake of adding altogether too much saltpeter and too little water. On 
the wedding day, when the ham was being boiled in the brine, the terrified, 
breathless housekeeper came running in to report that the ham had burst 
into flame and was throwing out flashes of lightning, and that the house was 
in danger of burning down. The ensuing scene was described by Gahn him- 
self in a letter written to Berzelius on September *20, 1807: “It was really 
a peculiar and pretty sight: first there rose, over the entire surface of the 
water in the kettle, bright, flashing sparks, which silently appeared and dis- 
appeared; then long and sometimes brilliant and violent streams of flashes 
were thrown in all directions over the water” (45). “After the kettle had 
been removed from the fire and left to cool,” said Gahn, “I could see that 
the shining particles were originally small ofl-Kke drops, several of which I 
quickly caught, and picked up, and found to be actually phosphorus /” (^5). 



56 


Discovery of the Elements 


The kind assistance of the late Dr. Max Speter of Berlin, who graciously 

contributed a number of important references on the early history of phos- 
phorus, is grateiully acknowledged. 

Literature Cited 

(1) Peters, Hermann, “Geschichte des Phosphors nach Leibniz und dessen Brief - 
wechsel,” Chem.^Ztg., 26, 1190-8 (Dec. 13, 1902). 

(2) Kunckel, J., “Vollstiindiges Laboratorium Chymicum,” 4th edition, Rudigersche 
Buchhandlung, Berlin, 1767, pp. 605-9. 

(3) Davis, T. L., “Kunckel and the early history of phosphorus,” J. Chbm. Educ., 
4, 1105-13 (Sept., 1927). 

(4) Leibniz, G. W., “Geschichte der Erfindung des Phosphors/' CreWs Neues chem . 
Archiv. 1, 213-8 (1784). 

(5) “Oeuvres Completes de Christian Huygens,” Vol. 8, Soc. Hollandaise des Sciences, 
The Hague, 1899, pp. 217, 236, 238, 248-9, 251-2, 256-7, 267; ibid., Vol. 10, 
1905, pp. 688-9, 696-7. 

(6) “The Works of the Honourable Robert Boyle,” Vol. 4, A. Millar, London. 1744, 
p. 21. 

(7) Boyle, R., “A phosphorus,” Phil. Trans. Abridgment, 5th edition, 3, 353-4 
(1749); Phil . Trans., 17, 583-4 (Jan., 1692). 

(8) Speter, Max, “Zur Geschichte Ses Urin-Phosph^rs: Das entdeckte Phosphor 
Rezept von Boyle-Hanckwitz,” Chem.-Ztg., 53, 1005-6 (Dec. 28, 1929). 

(9) Smith, E. F., “Forgotten chemists,” J. Chem. Educ., 3, 39-40 (Jan., 1926). 

(10) Hanckwitz, A. G., “Some experiments on the phosphorus urinae. . . . with several 
observations tending to explain the nature of that wonderful chemical pro- 
duction,” Phil. Trans., 38, 58-70 (1733-4); Phil Trans. Abridgment, ref. (7), 9, 
373-9 (1747); CreWs Neues chem . Archiv , 3, 6-14 (1785). 

(11) “Mineralogische, Chymische, und Alchemistische Briefe von reisenden und an- 
deren Gelehrten an den ehemaligen Chursachsischen Bergrath J. F. Henkel/* 
3 vols., Waltherische Buchhandlung, Dresden, 1794-95. 

(12) Buggb, G., “Das Buch der grossen Chemiker,” Vol. 1, Verlag Chemie, Berlin, 
1929, pp. 231-4. Article on Marggraf by Speter. 

(13) Marggraf, A. S., “Verschiedene neue Arten, den Harn phosphorus leichter zu 
verfertigen, und ihn geschwind aus Phlogiston und einem besondern Harnsalze 
zusammenzusetzen/' CreWs Neues chem. Archiv, 3, 300-3 (1785). 

(14) Speter, Max, “Zur Geschichte des Marggrafschen Urin- Phosphors,” Chem.- 
techn. Rundschau, 44, 1049-51 (Aug. 13, 1929). 

(15) Ince, J., “Ambrose Godfrey Hanckwitz,” Pharm. J., [1], 18, 126-30, 157-62, 
215-22 (Aug., Sept., Oct., 1858). 

(16) Ince, J., “On the discovery of phosphorus,” ibid., [1], 13, 280-2 (Dec., 1853). 

(17) Gore, G., “On the origin and progress of the phosphorus and match manufac- 
** tures/* Chem . News, 4, 16-8 (July 13, 1861). 

(18) Stephen, L. and S. Lee, “Dictionary of National Biography/ 1 Macmillan and 
Co., London, vol. 22, 1890, pp. 30-1. Article on Godfrey or Godfrey ^Hanckwitz . 

(19) “Nitrogen and phosphorus: A classic of science/* Sci. News Letter , 22, 102-3 
(Aug. 13, 1932), Reprint of Boyle's “Aerial Noctiluca,” ref, (6). 

(20) Dbrham, W., “Philosophical experiments and observations of the late eminent 
Dr. Robert Hooke, F.R.S.. '. .and other eminent Virtuoso's in his time,” W. and 
J. Innys, London, 1726, pp, 178-81. 



Literature Cited 57 

(21) Lewis, William, “The Chemical Works of Caspar Neumann, M.D.,” Johnston, 
Keith, Linde, etc., London, 1759, p. 582. 

(22) Pilcher, R. B. f “Boyle's laboratory,” Ambix, 2, Plate VII (June, 1938). 

(23) Gunther, R. T., “Early Science in Oxford,” printed for the author, Oxford, 1931, 
vol. 8, pp. 271-82. Boyle's “Short memorial of some observations made upon an 
artificial substance that shines without precedent illustration,” Sept., 1677. 

(24) Macqubr, P.-J., “Elements of the Theory and Practice of Chymistry,” A. Millar 
and J. Nourse, London, 1764, 2nd ed., vol. 1, pp. 273-7. 

(25) Weeks, M. E., “Max Speter, 1883-1942,” Isis, 34, 340-44 (Spring, 1943). 

(26) Tbsti, Gino, “Un punto oscuro di storia della chimica da investigare. L'opera de 
Raimondo di Sangro,” La Chimica nelV Industria, nelV Agricoltura , e nella Biolo- 
gia , 6, 412-13 (Oct. 31, 1930); Archeion, 13, 67-8 (1931). 

(27) von Klinckowstroem, Carl Graf, “Raimondo di Sangro,” ibid., 14, 490-1 
(1932). 

(28) Crass, M. F., Jr., “A history of the match industry,” J. Chem. Educ., 18, 116 
(Mar., 1941). 

(29) Waite, A. E., “The Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Paracelsus the Great,” 
James Elliott and Co., London, 1894, Vol. 2, p. 19. 

(30) Gunther, R. T., “Early Science in Oxford,” ref. (23), Vol. 7, pp. 588-9. 

(31) L6merv, N., “A Course of Chymistry,” Walter Kettilby, London, 1686, 2nd 
English ed. frpm the 5th French, p. 529. 

(32) Nollet, M. l'Abb 6, “Lemons de Physique Exp6rimentale,” Fr£res Guerin, Paris, 
1748, vol. 4, pp. 228-36. 

(33) Macquer, P.-J., “Elements of the Theory and Practice of Chymistry,” A. Millar 
and J. Nourse, 1764, 2nd ed., vol. 1, pp. 261-79. 

(34) Albinus, B., Dissertatio de Phosphoro Liquido et Solido,” Frankfurt-on-the 
Oder, 16S8. 

(35) Marggraf, A. S., “Chymische Schriften,” Arnold Wever, Berlin, 1768, revised 
ed., Vol. 1, pp. 75-7, 104-5. 

(36) Friend, J. N,, “A Textbook of Inorganic Chemistry,” Charles Griffin and Co., 
London, 1934, Vol. 6, part 2, pp. 4-5. “Phosphorus” by E. B. R. Prideaux. 

(37) Lavoisier, A.-L., “Traits Etementaire de Chimie,” Cuchet, Paris, 1793, 2nd ed., 
vol. 1, pp. 224-5. 

(38) Meyer, J. K. F., “Ueber die Phosphorsaure in dem griinen harzigten Bestand- 
theile der PflanzCnblatter,” CrelVs Ann., 1, 521-2 (1784). 

(39) Lewis, William, ref. (21), pp. 493-4. 

(40) Wallerius, J. G., “Untersuchung der Erden, aus Wasser, Pflanzen, und Thieren 
drittes Stuck; von der Erde aus Thieren,” CrelVs Neues chem. Archiv , 8, 285-6 
(1791); K. Vet. Acx£d. Handl., 22, 188 (1760). 

(41) Speter, Max, “Berzelius’ views on Gahn's share in the discovery of the composi- 

tion of bone earth,” Superphosphate, 6, 125-6 (July, 1933). In German, French, 
and English. * * 

(42) von Crell, L. “Versuch aus menschlichen Knochen einen Phosphorus zu berei- 
ten,” CrelVs Ckemisckes Journal, 1, 23-39 (1778). 

(43) Nordenski6ld, A. E., “C. W. Scheele. Nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnun- 
gen,” P. A. Norstedt and Sons, Stockholm, 1892, p. 318. Letter of Scheele to T. 
Bergman, Aug. 18, 1780. 

(44) Jarta, Hans “Aminnelse-tal dfver Herr Joh. Gotti. Gahn,” P, A. Norstedt and 
Sons, Stockholm, 1832, 51 pp. 

(45) SOdbrjbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Brev,” Almqvist and Wikseils Publishing 
Co„ Ups&la, 19 22, part 9, pp. 18-19. Letter of Gahn to Berzelius, Sept. 20, 1807. 



IV. SOME EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY METALS 


Among the metals isolated in the eighteenth century may be mentioned zinc , 
cobalt , nickel , and manganese , /fee last three of which were discovered in Sweden . 
The researches of Marggraf, Georg Brandt , Cronstedt , awd Cafew which led to 
the recognition and isolation of these elements were scientific contributions of the 
first rank , and the personalities of these great men are well worthy of study 
and emulation. Other metals of this period will be discussed in later chapters. 


“ Knowing how contented , free and joyful is life in the realms of 
science , one fervently wishes that many would enter their portals. ” 

a). 

Zinc 


Pliny the Elder and Dioscorides of Anazarbus mentioned that zinc com- 
pounds were used for healing wounds and sore eyes {41), {42). In the latter 



From Bugge’s " Dos Buck der grossen Chemiker 

Andrbas Sigismund Marggraf 
1709-1782 


part of the thirteenth century A.D., 
Marco Polo described the manufac- 
ture of zinc oxide in Persia: “Ku- 
benan is a large town. The people 
worship Mahommet. There is much 
iron and steel .... They also pre- 
pare both Tutia (a thing very good for 
the eyes) and Spodium; and I will 
tell you the process. They have a 
vein of a certain earth which has the 
required quality, and this they put 
into a great flaming furnace, whilst 
over the furnace there is an iron 
grating. The smoke and moisture, 
expelled from the earth of which I 
speak, adhere to the iron grating, and 
thus form Tutia, whilst the slag that 
is left after burning is the Spodium” 
(43). 


German chemist who distinguished Centuries before zinc was disco v- 
between potash and soda, realized that A . . . r .. 

day contains the peculiar oxide now cred in the metallic form, its ores were 

known as alumina, recognized mag- used for making brass. Ancient met- 
nesia, isolated zinc from calamine, and „ . , . , . . , .. . « . 

discovered sugar in the beet. allurgists probably lost this volatile 

metal as vapor because their appa- 
ratus was not designed for condensing it. The late E. O. von Lippmann, 
a great authority on the history of science, searched the writings of Aris- 
totle, Pliny, and Dioscorides in vain for any mention of it, but an idol coh- 

88 


Z, Angew. Chem.» 1912 

Production of Zinc in China as pictured in the Chinese technical lexicon 
Tien kong kai on.” 




60 


Discovery of the Elements 


taining 87.5% of that metal was found in a prehistoric Dacian ruin at Dor- 
dosch, Transylvania ( 2 ). P. C. R&y states that the Hindu king, Madana- 
p&la, recognized zinc as a metal as early as 1374 ( 3 ), and it is probable that 
the art of snelting the ores originated in India and was carried first to 
China. A Chinese book entitled “Tien kong kai ou” printed in 1637 de- 
scribes the ir etallurgy and uses of this metal ( 2 ), {44). 

A hundred years before zinc was smelted in Europe, it was being sold 
there by Portuguese traders who brought it from the Orient (4). G. Agri- 
cola mentioned the formation of “zincum” in the furnaces in Silesia (31). 
Small amounts of metallic zinc were obtained as a by-product of the lead 
industry at Goslar, Prussia, and G. E. Lohneyss described the process as 
follows: “The metal zinc or counterfeht is formed under the smelting fur- 
naces and in the crevices of the wall where the bricks are not well plastered. 
When the wall is scraped, the metal falls down into a trough placed to re- 
ceive it. The metal is not much valued, and the workmen collect it only 
when they are promised Trinkgeld” (2), (18), (28). 

Caspar Neumann (1683-1737) gave the following first-hand description 
of the Goslar zinc works: “The greatest quantities of Zinc come from the 
East Indies, in large oblong pieces; and from Goslar, commonly in round 
cakes or loaves. Of the origin of the East-India Zinc we have no certain 
account: The Goslarian is extracted from the Lead- and Silver-ores of 
Rammelsberg by a particular contrivance in the structure of the furnace. 
The Zinc, naturally contained in the ore, separates during the fusion from 
the other metallic matters, being elevated by the heat in form of fume, 
which passes into a reservoir made for that purpose in the front wall, over 
the gutter by which the Lead runs off. The reservoir for the Zinc is in- 
closed, on the inside, by a large flat stone, only some chinks being left for 
the fumes to enter; and on the outside, by another stone, which is closely 
luted, and frequently sprinkled during the process with cold water, to cool 
and condense the fumes. Each smelting lasts twenty hours, beginning at 
ten in the forenoon and ending at six next morning. When the fusion of 
the ore is completed, the workman dextrously strikes the outer stone of the 
reservoir with an Iron rod, so as to loosen some of the luting at the bottom ; 
upon which the Zinc, collected during the process, runs out like Quicksilver. 
He continues to tap till nothing more will run ; then melts the Zinc again 
in an iron pot, and casts it into hemispherical masses. I have several 
times been at this work, and kept at it two days and a night together with- 
out leaving the furnace. 

“Though a part of the Zinc is thus obtained in its metallic form, a part is 
also dissipated, and a very considerable one adheres to the sides of the 
furnace in the form of a calx. . . The produce of Zinc is extremely variable. . . 
At Goslar, when the due precautions happen to be neglected, there is not 
so much Zinc detained as to be worth collecting. . . ” (33) . 



Henckel’s Zinc 


61 


Johann Kunckel and Georg Ernst Stahl believed that the ore calamine 
contained a metal that alloys with copper to form brass, and even as late 
as 1735, the Swedish chemist Georg Brandt thought that calamine could 
not be reduced to a metal except in presence of copper ( 2 ), {19). During 
the years between 1768 and 1781, Richard Watson, Bishop of Llandaff, 
published his famous chemical essays {45 ) . In the one on zinc, he quoted 


the following passage 
from page 295 of the 
French translation of J. 
F. Henckel’s (or Hen- 
kel’s) “Pyritologia” : 
“One makes, for example, 
with the calamine, not 
only iron (in small 
amounts, to be sure), but 
also a very large quantity 
of zinc, which one ob- 
tains not only on present- 
ing to it the substance 
with which it can incorpo- 
rate itself (that is to say, 
copper, which is its lode- 
stone), but also this half- 
metal shows itself simply 
on addition of a fatty 
substance which metal- 
lizes; it is only necessary 
to avoid letting this 
phoenix be reduced to 
ash, to keep it from burn- 
ing, and to observe the 
time and circumstances” 
{46). Henckel prepared 
metallic zinc by reduc- 
tion of calamine, but 
kept the process secret 




Professor of chemistry, and later professor of divinity, 
at Cambridge. Between 1768 and 1781 he published a 
collection of chemical essays on water, air, coal, lead, 
zinc, salt, saltpeter, and other common substances. # He 
gave an excellent account of the early history of zinc. 


{29), {47). As the shin- 
ing metal came forth from the hard, lusterless ore, he was reminded of the 
Egyptian symbol of immortality, the phoenix, a fabulous bird which rose to 


new life from its ashes. 


In the introduction to his German translation of P. M. de Responds 


“Special Experiments on the Mineral Spirit,’ * Henckel mentioned in 1743 
that “In our smelting furnaces at Freyberg we have obtained the essence 


62 


Discovery of the Elements 


of zinc [zinckische Wesen] in power but not in form” (48). He believed that 
their failure to obtain “corporal” [metallic] zinc must have been due to the 
complex nature of their ore, to the construction of their furnaces, and to 
the long-continued heating, which made it “impossible for the phoenix, 
even when resurrected from its ash, to withstand the fire” (48). 

“Nevertheless,” said Henckel, “zinc is a metal with regard to its consist- 
ency, luster, specific gravity, tenacity, and mercurial fluidity in the fire, 
but also not a metal with respect to its flammability and complete com- 
bustibility, wherein it is entirely different from all other metals” (48). 

The Flemish metallurgist P. M. de Respour published the first edition of 
his “Special Experiments on the Mineral Spirit” in 1668, when he was 
twenty-four years old. He prepared a minute amount of metallic zinc 
by gently heating a mixture of zinc oxide and fat on a sandbath for six or 
seven days. When he subsequently distilled this mixture, he found in the 
retort only a little gray, fuming deposit in which he was unable to distin- 
guish any metallic particles. When he rubbed it with mercury, however, 
and distilled off the latter, he obtained a little metallic zinc (48). 

Bishop Watson stated that, “though Henckel was the first, Dr. Isaac 
Lawson was, probably, the second person in Europe who procured zinc from 
calamine .... Our English writers . . . speak in high terms of Lawson ...” 
(46). Since the Bishop prefaces his description of the metal with the words 
“If the reader has never seen a piece of zinc,” it must have been a rarity 
even in the second half of the eighteenth century (46). 

When Lawson observed that the flowers of lapis calaminaris were the 
same as those of zinc and that they had the same effect on copper, he 
worked tirelessly until he found a method of separating the zinc from this 
mineral. He never realized any profit, however, from this discovery (46). 

While in Leyden, Dr. Lawson belonged to a scientific club presided over 
by the great Swedish botanist Carl von Linne, and became so engrossed in 
making mineralogical analyses that he gave up attending lectures. Another 
of Lawson's Leyden contemporaries who held him in high esteem was Dr. 
Hermann Boerhaave (49), (50). 

Johann Andreas Cramer assisted Dr. Lawson for several years in his 
chemical experiments in Leyden. In the preface to the second English 
edition of Cramer's “Elements of the Art of Assaying Metals/' there is a 
fine tribute to Dr. Lawson, who “had resided much longer at Leyden than 
those foreigners usually do who go there to qualify themselves for the Prac- 
tice of Physick. He then employed himself in the Cultivation of those arts 
which he had there been taught; particularly of Chemistry; and was 
highly esteemed for his Skill therein, and lived in great Intimacy with 
Boerhaave . . . and with several other Men of great Learning* who resided 
in that University ... as also with Linnaeus . . * Doctor Lawson after- 
wards served as Physician to the British Army in Flanders; where, by 



Zinc from Calamine and Sphalerite 


63 


his Death, in the year 1745, the World was deprived of the Advantage of 
many useful Discoveries. To him we owe several of the Observations con- 
tained in this Work . . . ” (51). 

In a great research “On the method of extracting zinc from its true min- 
eral, calamine,” A. S. Marggraf in 1746 reduced calamine from Poland, 
England, Breslau, and Hungary with carbon in closed retorts, and obtained 
metallic zinc from all of them ( 2 ), (19), (27). He found the ore from 
Holywell to be especially rich in it. He stated that both J. H. Pott and 
J. H. Henckel had known how to prepare this metal and keep it from 
burning. 

Marggraf also showed that the lead ores of Rammelsberg contained zinc 
and that zinc can be prepared from blende, or sphalerite (53). “Who 
would think/’ said he, “that this furnace calamine [in Saxony] is derived 
from blende and that this blende contains the zinc earth, for I know of no 
one who ever thought of it except the aforementioned Herr Professor Pott, 
who mentioned on page 1 19 of his treatise on pseudo-galena that pulverized 
blende, melted with carbon and copper, did not, to be sure, entirely convert 
the copper to brass, yet made it rather yellow, and therefore correctly 
concluded that it must contain an earth related to calamine. Still less has 
anyone, so far as I know, ever yet made known the process of actually pre- 
paring zinc from this mineral, which, however, I hope to make clear from 
the following experiment” (53). 

Marggraf was probably unaware that in 1742 Anton von Swab, a step- 
brother of Emanuel Swedenborg, had distilled zinc from calamine at Ves- 
tervik, Dalecarlia, and that, two years later, he had even prepared it from 
blende (18). Since the vapors rose to the top of the alembic before passing 
into the receiver, this process was called distillation per ascension. In the 
fall of 1752 Swab and A. F. Cronstedt developed at government expense 
the use of Swedish zinc ores in the manufacture of brass, to avoid the neces- 
sity of importing calamine. They installed equipment near Skisshyttan 
for the washing, slow oxidation, decomposition, and calcination of the ore 
and for distillation of the zinc. Swab showed that blende can be reduced 
even in the absence of copper (52). In 1755 Cronstedt ’s share in the work 
was taken over by Sven Rinman (32), (46), (47). Rinman so improved the 
metallurgical process that zinc could be smelted not merely in the form of 
grains or powder, which required subsequent melting and consequent loss 
of metal, but also in fluid form directly from the ore (81). 

Even in the early nineteenth century, the value of sphalerite was not 
appreciated. In Henry R. Schoolcraft’s report on the lead mines of Mis- 
souri, which was published in the American Journal of Science for 1821, ap- 
pears the statement: “Zinc is abundant, but as the ore is the sulphuret, 
it is not very valuable. It is not mentioned that the calamine, which is 
the useful ore of zinc, has been found” (54). 



64 


Discovery of the Elements 

Some Swedish Metals 


In the eighteenth century Sweden outstripped all other countries in the 
discovery of new elements. It is blessed with a rich supply of rare ores 
and, moreover, it had a long succession of brilliant chemists and miner- 
alogists whose greatest delight was to investigate these curious minerals. 
In the century following the accidental discovery of phosphorus, three 
new metals, cobalt, nickel, and manganese, were discovered by Swedish 
chemists. 


Cobalt 

“Thus with Hermetic art the Adept combines 
The Royal acid with cobaltic mines; 

Marks with quick pen , in lines unseen portrayed , 

The blushing mead , green dell , and dusky glade; 

Shades with pellucid clouds the tintless field , 

And all the future Group exists conceal'd; 

Till waked by fire the dawning tablet glows , 

Green springs the herb f the purple floret blows , 

Hills , vales , and woods in bright succession rise , 

And all the living landscape charms the eyes ” (62). 

Analyses of blue glass made by the ancients show that the earliest speci- 
mens were colored sometimes with cobalt but much more often with cop- 
per (64), (65), (66). In the tomb of Tut-ankh-Amen were many specimens 
of dark blue glass, only one of which was found to contain cobalt (67). 

Paracelsus, in his “Book of Minerals/’ which forms part of the 1658 
Latin folio edition of his works, gave only a vague description of cobalt (7). 
The unknown author of the writings attributed to “Basil Valentine” stated 
in his treatise “On the great stone of the ancient philosophers” that 
“Among the minerals are included all metals, ores, marcasite, cobalt (Ko- 
bold), talc, zinc, shining pyrites, and stones” (63). Berthelot thought, 
however, that metallic cobalt must have been prepared before the thirteenth 
century, for the alchemists understood how to roast and reduce ores. They 
did not, however, know how to refine the metals and distinguish between 
them (7). 

Near the end of the fifteenth century, a troublesome and supposedly 
worthless mineral, “cobalt,” was found in large quantity in the mines on 
the borders of Saxony and Bohemia (68). The miners disliked it because 
of the labor of removing it and also because the arsenic in it injured their 
health. The first glassmaker who really understood the specific ability of 
these ores to impart a blue color to glass was Christoph Schiirer of Platten, 
Bohemia, who, in about the middle of the sixteenth century, prepared a 
blue color for pottery at the Eulen smelter in Neudeck (69). On a visit to 
Schneeberg he collected some pieces of the ore. When he tested them in 



Cobalt Glass 


65 


his glass-furnace, he found that they fused with the vitreous mass and 
yielded a handsome blue glass. At his plant in Neudeck he prepared the 
new color, first for the use of local potters and later for shipment to Nurem- 



Courtesy Tenney L. Davis 

Bernard Palissy 
1510 ?-l 589 


French glassmaker, surveyor, potter, agriculturist, and chemist who was familiar with 
“zaffer,” or cobalt blue. 

“ Who is it in the suburbs here , 

This Potter , working with such cheer , . • . 

This madman , as the people say , 

Who breaks his tables and his chairs 
To feed his furnace fires . • . 

0 Palissy! within thy breast 
Burned the hot fever of unrest” (82)': 


berg and thence to the Netherlands, where the skilled glass-painters under- 
stood better how to use it ( 68 ). 

The poorer grades were used for making bluing and blue starch for laun- 
dry ( 70 ). Roasted cobalt ore was soon exported in casks to eight color- 
mills in the Netherlands. When the people of Schneeberg began to remark 



66 


Discovery of the Elements 


that the part of the cobalt ore which dropped down while being roasted 
contained more color than the roasted ore itself, Elector Johann Georg sub- 
sidized the development of an extensive cobalt industry there (68). A 
mixture of roasted cobalt ore and sand, which was added to conceal its 
nature, was known as Zaffer , Safflor , or Safran. Most of the cobalt ores in 
the Erzgebirge also contained bismuth, which was easily separated by 
liquation. 

After mentioning calamine, Vannoccio Biringuccio stated in his “Piro- 
technia” in 1540: “Another similar half-mineral is Zaffer. It is heavy like 
metal. It does not melt by itself, but when mixed with vitreous substances 
it becomes like water and colors them blue. Zaffer is therefore used for 
coloring glasses blue or for painting glass vessels with a blue color. At the 
artist’s desire, it also serves as a black pigment in these crafts, by taking 
more of it than is permissible for blue” (71). 

The great sixteenth -century French ceramist Bernard Palissy once 
wrote: “I know no plant nor mineral nor any substance which can tinge 
stones blue or azure except saphre, which is a mineral earth, extracted from 
gold, silver, and copper, which has very little color, except gray inclining 
a little toward the violet. Whenever the said saphre is incorporated with 
vitreous substances, it makes a marvelously fine azure: hence one may 
know that all stones having an azure color have taken their tint from the 
said saphre” (72). 

In his “Art of Glass,” an English translation of which was published in 
1699, Haudicquer de Blancourt, who was especially fond of blue because 
“it has resemblance to that of the Heavenly Arch and is taken for the Sym- 
bol of Generosity,” gave specific directions for the preparation of metallic 
pigments used to tinge glass and “set it off with an unspeakable Beauty” 
(73). He told how Father Antonio Neri used to prepare “Zaffer” by heat- 
ing the ore to redness in the furnace, sprinkling it with vinegar, grinding it, 
and washing it by decantation with warm water (73) t (74). In his “Ars 
Vitraria Experimentalis” Johann Kunckel explained that the acetic acid 
used in this process was unnecessary and that the roasting of the ore served 
to remove the arsenic, which was then collected, resublimed, and sold in 
the apothecary shops (70). 

Georg Brandt, the discoverer of cobalt, was bom in the spring of 1694 
at Riddarhytta, Vestmanland, where his father, Jurgen Brandt, a former 
apothecary, operated a copper smelter, an iron-works, and some mines. 
At an early age Georg began to help his father with his chemical and metal- 
lurgical experiments. He studied medicine and chemistry for three years 
at Leyden under the famous Hermann Boerhaave and received his degree 
of doctor of medicine at Reims in 1726. Although he never carried on a 
general practice, he was one of the physicians called to the death-bed of 
Fredrik I (5), (6), ($ 4 ). 



Metallic Cobalt 


67 


On his way home from the Netherlands he studied mining and metal- 
lurgy in the Harz, and in 1727 he was placed in charge of the chemical 
laboratory at the Bureau of Mines in Stockholm, which was then in poor 
financial condition. After the laboratory was sold, Brandt and his stu- 
dents, Henrik Teofil Scheffer and Axel Fredrik Cronstedt, carried on their 
epoch-making researches at the Royal Mint, and in 1730 Brandt became 
assay-master of the Mint. Three years later he published a systematic 
investigation of arsenic and its compounds in which he showed that ar- 
senic is a “semi-metal” and that “white arsenic” [arsenious oxide] is its 
calx (35). 

Brandt's most important contribution to science was his discovery of 
the element cobalt. Since the mineral which had been used since the six- 
teenth century for making “Zaffer,” or smalt, resembled copper ores in its 
ability to give blue solutions when dissolved in acids, yet (even in minute 
amounts) imparted a much deeper blue color to glass than copper 
compounds do, it was called “cobalt” from the German word Kobold , 
meaning subterranean gnome. These little, teasing earth sprites are fre- 
quently mentioned in Goethe’s “Faust”: 


Salamander soil gliihen 
Undone sich winden , 
Sylphe verschwinden , 
Kobold sich miihen. 


Salamander shall kindle, 
Writhe nymph of the wave, 
In air sylph shall dwindle, 
And Kobold shall slave. 


Wer sie nicht kennte 
Die Elemente } 

Ihre Kraft , 

Und Eigenschafty 
Ware kein Meister 
Uber die Geister. ( 8 ) 


Who doth ignore 
The primal Four, 

Nor knows aright 
Their use and might, 
O'er spirits will he 
Ne’er master be. (5) 


The Kobolds, according to an ancient German superstition, delighted in 
destroying the work of the miners, causing them endless trouble; and in 
mining towns the people used to pray in the churches for deliverance 
from the power of these malicious spirits (7). 

In 1730 or before, Georg Brandt prepared a dark blue pigment from an 
ore found at the Skil& copper works (Riddarhytta) in Westmanland (39). 
Specimens of this “fargcobalt” are still preserved in the Cederbaum collec- 
tion at Oskarshamn. Since the first accurate description of metallic cobalt 
is to be found in Brandt’s dissertation on the half -metals in the Acta Liter- 
aria et Scientiarum Sveciae for 1735, it has frequently been stated that co- 
balt was discovered in that year. Nils Zenz6n has shown, however, that 
this issue of the Acta was not published until 1739 and that the portion of 
Brandt’s “Diarium Chymicum” which records his researches from the lat- 
ter part of 1737 to the end of 1738 is merely a Swedish edition of the Dis- 
sertatio de semi-metaltis. 



68 


Discovery of the Elements 


According to Zenzdn, Brandt stated in his diary for 1741 (which was not 
edited until 1744) : “As there are six kinds of metals, so I have also shown 
with reliable experiments, in my dissertation on the half-metals which I 
presented to the Royal Academy of Sciences in Upsala in 1735, that there 
are also six kinds of half-metals. The same, dissertation shows that I, 
through my experiments, had the good fortune ... to be the first discoverer 
of a new half -metal, namely cobalt regulus, which had formerly been con- 
fused with bismuth ...” (39). Zenz£n believes, however, that this date 
must be attributed to Brandt's lack of memory. After separating this 
metal by fire assay, he named it cobalt for the mineral from which he had 
extracted it. In his “Dissertation on the semi-metals” Brandt stated that 
six metals andsix “half -metals” (mercury, bismuth, zinc, and the reguluses 
of antimony, cobalt, and arsenic) were then known. By a “half -metal” he 
meant a substance which resembles the metals in color, weight, and form 
but which is not malleable. Since most bismuth ores contain cobalt, he 
gave six ways of distinguishing between these two “semi-metals.” 

“1. When bismuth is broken with a hammer, it gives a fracture com- 
posed of little super-imposed laminae. The regulus of cobalt is more like a 
true metal. Moreover there is a very great difference in the color of these 
two metals. . . 

2. In fusing they do not mingle at all with each other; it is easy to 
separate them with a stroke of the hammer; for they are attached about as 
an almond is to its stone; and in this union they seem to be separated by a 
segment of a circle so that they both appear to form but a single regulus, 
at one end of which is found the bismuth, or marcasite, and at the other 
the regulus of cobalt. 

3. The regulus of cobalt, pulverized and calcined, gives, when one fuses 
it with flint and fixed alkali, a blue glass, known under the names zaffera , 
sasre, or smalt. Marcasite does not give any smalt. The blue glass 
which bismuth ore sometimes gives is produced by the cobalt which is al- 
most always found in the ores of this semi-metal. 

4. Bismuth melts easily; when kept fused, it becomes calcined like 
lead and converted into a yellow powder, which, when melted, gives a 
glass of the same color as that of lead. . . 

5. Bismuth amalgamates with mercury; which the regulus of cobalt 
does not do at all. 

6. Bismuth dissolves in nitric add and in aqua regia ; both solutions are 
predpitated by pure water in the form of a white powder. When the 
regulus of cobalt is dissolved in these menstrua, it cannot be predpitated 
from them except by the alkalies; fixed alkali predpitates it in the form of a 
powder which, after being washed, remains dark and black; whereas when 
one predpitates it with volatile alkali, espedally if it has been dissolved by. 



Death of Brandt and Swab 69 

aqua regia, it acquires a very red color, which changes to blue, if one ex- 
poses it to the fire up to the point of redness” (27). 

Brandt later made a more complete investigation of cobalt. He also 
demonstrated that common salt and soda contain the same (mineral) al- 
kali, whereas saltpeter contains the vegetable alkali. This confirmed the 
earlier work of Duhamel du Monceau. Brandt encouraged the use of 
Swedish zinc in the manufacture of brass. When he died at Stockholm on 
April 29, 1768, his death was mourned by the entire scientific world. He 
was one of the ablest chemists of his time (6). 

A. F. Cronstedt once spoke eloquently of “what a Brandt in our time can 
accomplish in cramped quarters, with broad knowledge and with zeal 
which even age cannot check. This honored man, whose presence here 
prevents me from saying what I wish, received chemistry and its instru- 
ments (already rusting after Hjarne’s death) with newer views in natural 
science, with thorough mathematical knowledge, and with systematic order 
such as his master Boerhaave of Leyden had employed. Thereafter, fol- 
lowed only experiments which all scholars could apply to experimental 
physics and from which husbandry could quickly benefit. The science was 
presented as clearly as it had formerly been made obscure, and from that 
day, it has gradually gained the right to instruct the youth in our uni- 
versities, to the great gain of both parties” (75). 

After Anton von Swab and Georg Brandt had died in the same year, 
Carl von Linn6 said: “The kingdom and our sciences have now lost in a 
single year two stars of the first magnitude, Brandt and Swab. The Bureau 
of Mines and the science of mining have lost their supporting pillars. Men 
such as these never spring up like mushrooms. So far as I know, Europe 
has none like them .... A king can lose an army, but within a year have 
another just as good. A king can lose a fleet and within two years have 
another rigged up, but a Brandt and a Swab cannot be gotten again during 
his entire reign” (52). The History of the Swedish Academy of Sciences 
describes Brandt as “frugal, taciturn, and solitary” (76). 

In 1776 a Hungarian chemist, Petrus Madacs, defended a thesis in which 
he claimed, as did J. J. Winterl, that cobalt is a compound of iron and 
arsenic, but admitted that nickel is an element. He distinguished clearly 
between copper and nickel and stated that “copper and arsenic never give 
nickel” (77). 

Although chemists long disputed the elemental nature of cobalt, perhaps 
because they were unable to reduce the blue smalt to the metal, Torbem 
Bergman explained in 1780 that, because of the high coloring power of 
cobalt, only a small amount of it need be present in smalt. He heated 
many kinds of cobalt glass with black flux and was able, in each case, to 
obtain the metal, but only in small amounts (78). He distinguished defi- 
nitely between nickel and cobalt, stated that nickel never gives a blue glass 



70 


Discovery of the Elements 


nor a sympathetic ink nor a red solution in acids and that cobalt never 
gives a green one, and that pure nickel readily alloys with silver, whereas 
cobalt does not (78), From experiments with the preparation of smalt 
and sympathetic ink in the following year, Sven Rinman also concluded 
that cobalt and nickel are two entirely different metals (79). 

Nickel 

Axel Fredrik Cronstedt, the discoverer of nickel, was born on December 
23, 1722, in the province of Sodermanland in Sweden (5). His father, a 
lieutenant-general, gave him a good education, and he soon demonstrated 
his ability in physical science and mathematics. He rendered great serv- 



Urban Hiarne, 1641-1724 

Swedish physician, mineralogist, and poet. Assessor and later acting president of 
the Swedish Bureau of Mines. Author of "Regium Laboratorium Chymicum,” Stock- 
holm, 1683. In 1694 he mentioned the ore Kupfernickel, in which Cronstedt more than 
half a century later discovered nickel. 

ice to his country as a metallurgist in the Bureau of Mines, and his name 
will always be honored because of the brilliant manner in which he discov- 
ered the useful metal nickel (8), (24). 

The history of this metal is similar to that of cobalt. An alloy of nickel 
called packfong (or paktong) was used by the Chinese long before the metal 
was known in Europe (7), (23). In Germany a heavy, reddish brown ore, 
frequently found covered with green spots or stains, was used to color 
glass green; the miners called it Kupfernickel {21). Since Nickel , like 
Kobold, means deceptive Utile spirit, the word Kupfernickel may be trans- 
lated, false copper. Urban Hiarne, in a work on metals published in 1604, 
expressed a belief that Kupfernickel was a kind of cobalt or arsenic mixed - 




Discovery of Nickel 


71 


with copper, but in this view there was only a germ of truth (7), (24), A. 
F. Cronstedt once said, “Hiarne in his lifetime pursued chemical research 
most zealously. With all his creative genius and his desire to support 
Cartesian natural science with chemical arguments and conclusions, he 
still did not fail to consider the practical use which industry could demand 
of it. With the support of the authorities, he therefore occupied himself 
with the testing and investigation of substances from all realms of nature 
and all parts of the country” (75). 

Although no one had ever succeeded in extracting copper from Kupfer - 
nickel , J. H. Linck (or Link) stated in 1726 that, since it gives green solu- 
tions when dissolved in nitric acid, it 
must be a cobalt ore containing copper 
(24), (80) When Swedish cobalt 
miners found a reddish yellow ore 
which imparted little or no blue color 
when fused with glass frit, they called 
it “cobalt which had lost its soul” 

( 21 ). 

In 1751 Axel JFredrik Cronstedt 
investigated a new mineral which he 
found in the cobalt mine at Los, Farila 
parish, Halsingland (21), In one of 
his experiments he placed a piece of 
iron in the acid solution of the ore, 
expecting to see the copper deposit 
on it. To his great surprise, he was 
unable to secure a deposit of any kind, 
for, as is now well known, niccolite 
contains no copper (9). Upon calcin- 
ing the green crystals which covered 
the surface of some weathered Kup- 
fernickel, and reducing the calx, or 
oxide, by heating it with charcoal, Cronstedt obtained a white metal bear- 
ing no resemblance whatever to copper. After studying its physical, chemi- 
cal, and magnetic properties, he announced in the Memoirs of the Stock- 
holm Academy that he had discovered a new metal, different from all 
others, for which he proposed the name nickel (7)\ (21). 

He said, 

This salt or this vitriol, after having been calcined, gives a coleothar 
or clear, gray residue which, when fused with three parts of black flux, 
gives a regulus of 50 pounds per quintal. This regulus is yellowish on 
the outside, but in the fracture it is silver-colored with iridescent colors* 
and composed of little laminae, quite similar to those of bismuth. It is 



Balthasar-Georgbs Sage 
1740-1824 


French analytical and mineralogical 
chemist of the phlogistic school. In 
his " Analyse Chimique” published in 
1786, he gave methods of testing and 
analyzing coal, clay, water, and many 
minerals. 


72 Discovery of the Elements 

hard and brittle, only feebly attracted by the magnet, calcination 
changes it to a black powder; these two properties come from the iron 
which has passed into the vitriol. This regulus dissolves in aqua fortis, 
aqua regia, and spirit of salt; it gives on dissolving a brilliant green 
color, and there precipitates a black powder which, when heated before 
the enamelers’ blowpipe, gives signs of phlogiston and of the metallic 
part which it contains. . . . ( 7 ), {21). 

The slight magnetization observed by Cronstedt is a property of nickel it- 
self. In 1751 he mixed some Kupfernickel with “black flux,” placed 
the mixture in a crucible, and covered it with a layer of common salt. 
Upon roasting it he not only reduced the oxide to the metallic state, 
but melted the metal. Not until 1754 did he publicly christen it. “The 
greatest quantity of the new previously described half metal,” said he, 
“is contained in Kupfernickel; therefore I retain the same name for its 
regulus or call it nickel for short. For my experiments I have used a mas- 
sive Kupfernickel from the Kuhschacht [Cow Shaft] in Freiberg, Saxony” 
{21). Kupfernickel, or niccolite, is now known to be an arsenide of nickel. 

Many chemists in Sweden and in other parts of the world immediately 
accepted Cronstedt’ s claim to the discovery of a new element, but Sage 
{22) and Monnet in France believed that his nickel was merely a mixture of 
cobalt, arsenic, iron, and copper (7). ^ Asamatter.of fact, it was somewhat 

contaminated with iron, cobalt, and 
arsenic; and therefore the great pioneer 
in analytical chemistry, Torbern Berg- 
man, carried out an elaborate series 
of experiments by means of which he 
obtained nickel in a high state of 
purity. The results he published in 
1775 completely confirmed those of 
Cronstedt, for he showed that no 
combination of iron, arsenic, cobalt, 
and copper will duplicate the proper- 
ties of nickel. Bergman’s pupil, 
Johan Arvidsson Afzelius, defended 
these views at Upsala in 1775 (7), (36). 

Even after this proof, some chem- 
ists were very conservative about 
accepting the new element. William 
Nicholson, in his “First Principles of 
Chemistry” published in 1796, gave 
the following account of it: 

This metallic substance has not 
been applied to any use; and the 
chief attention of those chemists 



Torbern Bergman, 1735-1784 


Swedish chemist, mineralogist, and 
editor. Author of the “ Opuscula 
physica et ckemica ;, M a six-volume 
treatise. Among his students were 
Gahn, the discoverer of manganese; 
Hjehn, who isolated molybdenum; and 
the d'Elhuyar brothers, who discovered 
tungsten. 


Nickel and Manganese 


73 


who have examined it has been directed to obtain it in a state of 
purity; which, however, has not yet been accomplished. . . . Nickel 
has been thought to be a modification of iron. ... So long as no 
one is able to produce this metal from pure iron or copper, and to 
explain in an intelligible way the process by which it can be generated, 
we must continue to regard it as a peculiar substance, possessing dis- 
tinct properties. The general opinions of chemists concur in admitting 
the force of this reasoning ( 10 ). 


Cronstedt’ s fame does not rest alone on his discovery of nickel, for he 
made an excellent classification of minerals which was translated into 
several languages. Berzelius said of him, “Cronstedt, the founder of the 
chemical system of mineralogy, a man who by his acuteness in that science 
rose so far above his age that he was never correctly understood by it, 
used the blowpipe to distinguish between minerals'’ ( 11 ). Ability to use 
this instrument skilfully and without fatigue and injury to health required, 
as Berzelius pointed out, an intensive training that few chemists care 
to undergo. Nevertheless, Cronstedt acquired such unusual control over it 
that he could direct a candle-flame upon a sample no larger than the head 
of a pin and make it white-hot ( 11 ). Jagnaux states that Cronstedt and 
Rinman operated a successful plant for distilling zinc, and that they 


“were as well versed in metallurgy as 
also discovered a zeolite, one of the 
silicates so widely used for softening 
water, and wrote a paper on it in 1756. 
He died in Saters parish near Stock- 
holm on August 19, 1765 ( 32 ). 

Manganese 

When Cronstedt died, the man who 
is conceded to be the discoverer of 
manganese was exactly twenty years 
old. Johan Gottlieb Gahn was bom 
at Voxna, an iron-mining town in South 
Helsingland on August 19, 1745 ( 5 ). 
Left fatherless at an early age and 
obliged to earn his living in the mines, 
he shared the joys and sorrows of the 
laborers and learned mining “on the 
lowest and wettest level” (17). He 
studied mineralogy under Bergman, 
became expert in the use of the blow- 
pipe, and, according to Berzelius, al- 
ways carried it with him, even on the 
shortest trips. When Gahn demon- 


in mineralogy” ( 4 ). Cronstedt 



Johan Gottlieb Gahn 
1745-1818 

Swedish chemist, mineralogist, 
and mining engineer. Manufac- 
turer of copper, sulfur, sulfuric 
acid, and red ochre. Discoverer of 
metallic manganese. 


74 


Discovery of the Elements 


strated the presence of copper in certain kinds of paper by burning a quar- 
ter of a sheet, heating the ash with the blowpipe, and displaying a tiny 
speck of the red metal, the young Berzelius watched him with wonder and 
admiration (11). J. Nickl&s believed, however, that this copper must 
have been volatilized from Gahn’s burner (40). 

Pyrolusite has been used for centuries in the manufacture of glass. 
After mentioning the production of blue glass with “zaffer” (a mixture of 
roasted cobalt ore and sand), Vannoccio Biringuccio wrote in his “Piro- 
technia” in 1540, ‘‘There is still another half mineral of the same kind, so- 
called Braunstein. This comes from Germany and is found especially in 
Tuscany in Mt. Viterbo and at Salodiana in the neighborhood of Monte- 
castello, near Cara. It is dark rust brown. It does not melt so that one 
can obtain metal from it. But when one adds vitrifiable substances to it, 
it colors them a handsome violet. The master glass-makers color their 
glasses a wonderful violet with it. The master potters also use it for violet 
decorations. Braunstein, moreover, when mixed with molten glass, has 
the special property of purifying it and making it white instead of green or 
yellow” (57). Because of the last-named property, glass-makers used to 
call it sapo vitri , or glass soap. 

The Berlin glass and porcelain technologist, J. H. Pott, believed that py- 
rolusite consisted of phlogiston and* an earth somewhat like that in alum 
(58). In 1740 he prepared “chameleon mineral” (potassium permanganate) 
and other compounds from it and showed that iron is not a constituent of 
pure pyrolusite (13). 

The first person to prepare a little metallic manganese was probably 
Ignatius Gottfried Kaim, who described it in his dissertation, “De metallis 
dubiis,” which was published at Vienna in 1770 (12). Although this pub- 
lication is rare and inaccessible, P.-J. Macquer left an abstract of it in his 
famous chemical dictionary. By heating a mixture of one part of pulver- 
ized pyrolusite with two parts of black flux, Kaim obtained a bluish-white, 
brittle metal with countless shining facets of different shapes, showing in 
the fracture a play of colors from blue to yellow. He claimed that this 
regulus was free from iron (59). This incomplete research attracted little 
notice. The mineral was also known by the confusing names “black mag- 
nesia” and “manganese.” Bergman knew, however, that it was not a 
compound of the alkaline earth, magnesia, for he said, “The mineral called 
black magnesia is nothing other than the calx of a new metal, which must 
not be confounded with lime nor with magnesia alba.” He failed, however, 
in all attempts to reduce the ore (15), (25), and finally turned the problem 
over to his friend, Scheele, who in 1774, after experimenting for three years, 
presented his results to the Stockholm Academy in the form of a paper en- 
titled, “Concerning Manganese and Its Properties.” In this epoch- 
making dissertation he announced the existence of the gaseous element 



Metallic Manganese 


75 


chlorine and paved the way for the discovery of oxygen gas and the metals, 
barium and manganese. Scheele stated that the mineral known as “man- 
ganese” was the calx of a metal different from any then known (26). 

Although Pott, Bergman, and Scheele all believed in the existence of the 
metal manganese none of them were able to isolate it. However, in 1774 
Gahn (25) lined a crucible with moist charcoal dust, placed in the center a 
mixture of the pulverized pyrolusite and oil, and covered it with more of 
the charcoal dust. After luting another crucible to this, he heated them 
intensely for an hour and, upon opening the apparatus, he found in it a 
button of metallic manganese weighing about a third as much as the ore 
from which he had isolated it (13), (30). For the accomplishment of this 
difficult reduction and for the isolation of this important metal, Gahn 
deserves high praise. 

This discovery, like most of his others, was not published in any scientific 
journal. In his first attempts, Gahn obtained what Scheele called “re- 
duced pyrolusite . . . combined with much phlogiston and a little iron.” 
On May 16, 1774, Scheele sent him some purified pyrolusite with the sug- 
gestion, “I am eagerly waiting to see what kind of result this pure Braun- 
stein will give when you apply your hell-fire to it, and I hope you will 
send me a little of the regulus as soon as possible” (37). On June 27th of 
the same year, Scheele thanked Gahn for the manganese regulus [“regulum 
tnagnesiae”] and added, “I believe that the Braunstein regulus is a half 
metal different from other half metals and closely related to iron” (37). 

In his notes to H. T. Scheffer’s chemical lectures, which were published 
in 1775, Torbern Bergman stated that a fifteenth metal had recently been 
added to the fourteen which Scheffer had discussed. Because of its weight, 
ability to color glass, and its precipitation with ferrocyanides (blodlut), 
Bergman had suspected that pyrolusite must contain a peculiar metal as 
an essential constituent. “At the same time,” said he, “Hr. J. G. Gahn, 
without knowing of my reasons, actually brought forth from it by reduc- 
tion a half metal which in refractoriness approaches nearest to platinum, 
and which, moreover, does not resemble any of those previously known .... 
Since then, I, too, have obtained the regulus of pyrolusite by reduction, 
but could not purify it from iron” (38). 

In 1785 P. J. Hjelm published in the Nya Handlingar of the Swedish 
Academy of Sciences a detailed description of this reduction. He obtained 
his specimens from a pyrolusite quarry in Undenas parish in Vermland. 
After placing a mixture of a known weight of the pulverized sample with a 
little oil or melted tallow and powdered coal dust or blood charcoal in a 
large covered crucible lined with a mixture of iron-free clay and coal dust, 
he applied sufficient heat from his forge to volatilize the oil without allow- 
ing it to burst into flame. In less than an hour, he obtained a regulus which 
weighed more than half as much as the original crude pyrolusite. Assessor 



76 


Discovery of the Elements 


Qvist suggested to him that the metal could be produced more economically 
in a cast steel furnace or wind furnace (60) . 

J. C. Ilsemann of Clausthal also obtained manganese independently with- 
out previous knowledge of the methods used by Gahn and Bergman. Ilse- 
mann reduced 1 10 pounds of pyrolusite from Ilsefeld by heating it with a 
mixture of fluorspar, lime, powdered charcoal, and ignited salt, and ob- 
tained four and one-half pounds of impure metallic manganese from which 
he was unable to separate the iron (61). 

In 1784 Gahn was made assessor at the College of Mines; he also served 
as deputy to the 1819 Diet, and was known politically as a Liberal (14). 
He was not only a brilliant chemist and mineralogist and a conscientious 
public official, but also a highly successful business executive. He owned 
and managed mines and smelters, and introduced new industrial methods; 
and it was in his sulfuric acid plant that Berzelius discovered the element 
selenium. During the American Revolution, when large amounts of pure 
copper were needed for sheathing ships, Gahn’s plant at Stora Kopparberg 
was able to fill large rush orders (15). It is a curious fact that Assessor 
Gahn bore such a striking resemblance in features, gestures, and intellectual 
interests to Dr. William Hyde Wollaston, the English scientist who later 
discovered palladium and rhodium, that he was often called “the Wollaston 
of Stockholm” (16). Berzelius once*stated, in fact, that one “would take 
them for sons of the same father” (16). Thomas Thomson, who once 
visited Assessor Gahn at his home in Fahlun, said that “his manners were the 
most simple, unaffected and pleasing of all the men of science” he had ever 

met, and that “benevolence and goodness of heart beamed in his 

countenance.” 

When Edward Daniel Clarke visited Fahlun, he said that “perhaps in 
no part of the world” will the traveler “meet with superintendents so well 
informed ... at the head of whom is the celebrated Gahn, whose ac- 
quirements, and the kindness he has always shewn to strangers, have en- 
titled him to respect and consideration in all the Academical Institutions of 
Europe .... Hospitality in a Swede is what we may always expect; but 
the attention paid to strangers by Mr. Gahn, especially if their visits had 
any view to science, was of a more exalted nature. He not only shewed a 
zeal, as if actuated by a religious duty, to satisfy scientific inquiries; but he 
did more — he directed them; and himself endeavoured to stimulate the 
ardour of those with whom he conversed ... by exciting and then gratifying 
their curiosity” (55). 

At the time of his sixty-eighth birthday, Gahn received a novel congratu- 
latory note from Berzelius, which read: “From Herr Assessor’s last letter 
I was happy to find new support for the doctrine of definite proportions. 
Herr Assessor was 68 on August 19; the following day (the 20th) I became 



Literature Cited 77 

34; now 34 X 2 = 68, from whence it follows that Herr Assessor is equal to 
a multiple of me by two ...” (56). 

Gahn, unfortunately, left most of his scientific work unpublished, leaving 
only a few papers on the blowpipe, on a sensitive balance, and on economy 
in the operation of smelters. He died in Stockholm on December 8, 1818, 
at the age of seventy-three years. In a biographical sketch in the “Annals 
of Philosophy,” one may read this high tribute: 

To sum up the whole, we may safely say that he was alike eminent as 
a practical chemist and mechanic, as a patriot in public, and a friend in 
private life, as presiding over the interests of the miner and of the 
farmer, and in fine 4s the guardian and overseer of the large family of 
his native poor,* It will not indeed be easy to find another whose 
talents have been at once more brilliant and more useful, who has been 
more admired and more loved by his country, than John Gottlieb 
Gahn (15). 


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* Assessor Gahn helped to establish the first poorhouse at Fahlun. 



78 


Discovery of the Elements 


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( 25 ) Bergman, T., “Opuscula Physica et Chemica," ref. ( 18 ), Vol. 2, pp. 201-3. 

( 26 ) Schbele, C. W., “Sammtliche physische und chemische Werke," translated into 
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( 27 ) Brandt, G., "Dissertation sur les demi-m6taux," Recueil des Memoir es de Chymie, 
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(29) Henckel, J. F., “Abhandlung von dem Zinke," Cr ell's Neues chem. Archiv, 2, 
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( 30 ) NordenskiOld, A. E., “Scheeles nachgelassene Briefe und Auf zeichnungen, ’ ' P. A. 
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( 31 ) Hoover, H. C. and L. H. Hoover, "Georgius Agricola. De re metallica trans- 
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10 . 



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(32) “Svenskt biografiskt lexikon," Albert Bonniers Boktryckeri, Stockholm, 1929, 
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(33) Lewis, William, “The chemical works of Caspar Neumann, M.D./’ Johnston, 
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m6moires de l’acad&nie royale de Stockolm . . . 1720-1760, P. Fr. Didot le Jeune, 
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(45) Bartow, Virginia, “Richard Watson, eighteenth-century chemist and clergy- 
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80 Discovery of the Elements 

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V. THREE IMPORTANT OASES 


Chemists of the eighteenth century were intensely interested in “air" which 
they prepared by fermentation by heating various chemical compounds , and 
by allowing substances of vegetable and animal origin to putrefy . Gradually 
the idea dawned that , as Priestley expressed it , there are “different kinds of 
air" and that Cavendish's “inflammable air from metals" is quite different 
from Daniel Rutherford's “noxious air" and from Scheele's “fire air" The 
preparation and recognition of the three gases , hydrogen nitrogen , and oxygen 
required true genius. For further information about Rutherford see pp. 106-20 . 


“The generality of men are so accustomed to judge of things by 
their senses that , because the air is invisible , they ascribe but little 
to it , and think it but one remove from nothing" (1) 



From Bugge’s ** Das Buck der grossen Chemiktr *■ 


Georg Ernst Stahl 
1660-1734 

German chemist, physician, and 
professor. Co-founder of the phlogis- 
ton theory of combustion. Author 
of u Fundamenta Chymiae Dogmatical 
et Experimentalist He distinguished 
between potash and soda and recog- 
nized that alum contains a peculiar 
earth different from all others. 


In the latter part of the seven- 
teenth century, Johann Joachim 
Becher and Georg Ernst Stahl ad- 
vanced a peculiar theory of combus- 
tion that held sway over the minds of 
chemists for nearly a hundred years. 
They maintained that everything 
that can be burned contains a sub- 
stance, phlogiston, which escapes in 
the form of flame during the combus- 
tion, and until Lavoisier overthrew 
this theory in 1777, practically all 
chemists believed that a metal con- 
sists of its calx, or oxide, and phlogis- 
ton. It was in this period of chemi- 
cal history that the gases hydrogen, 
nitrogen, and oxygen were discovered. 

Hydrogen 

Hydrogen was observed and col- 
lected long before it was recognized as 
an individual gas. The statement 
of Paracelsus (1493-1541) that “Luft 
erhebt sich und bricht herfur gleichwie 
ein Wind"? has often been cited 
Van Helmont, Boyle, Ma- 


erroneously as an allusion to this gas (2), (37). 
* “Air rises and breaks forth like a wind.” 


Hydrogen 


83 


yow, and Stephen Hales all had some slight acquaintance with hydro- 
gen. In his “New experiments touching the relation betwixt flame and 
air,” which were ready for publication in 1671, Robert Boyle dissolved iron 
in dilute hydrochloric or sulfuric acid and prepared hydrogen in the form of 
“inflammable solution of Mars [iron]” { 44 ). 

“Having provided a saline spirit [hydrochloric acid]/’ said Boyle, . . 
we put into a vial, capable of containing three or four ounces of water, a 
very convenient quantity of filings of steel, which were not such as are 
commonly sold in shops to chemists and apothecaries (those being usually 
not free enough from rust) but such 
as I had a while before caused to be 
purposely filed off from a piece of good 
steel. This metalline powder being 
moistened in the vial with a little 
of the menstruum, was afterwards 
drenched with more; whereupon the 
mixture grew very hot, and belched 
up copious and stinking fumes ; which, 
whether they consisted altogether 
of the volatile sulphur of the Mars, or 
of metalline steams participating of 
a sulphureous nature, and joined with 
the saline exhalations of the men- 
struum, is not necessary to be here 
discussed. But whencesoever this 
stinking smoke proceeded, so inflam- 
mable it was, that on the approach of 
a lighted candle to it, it would readily 
enough take fire and bum with a blue- 
ish and somewhat greenish flame at 
the mouth of the vial for a good while 
together; and that, though with little 
light, yet with more strength than one 
would easily suspect’ * { 44 ). Nicolas 
L&nery described it in 1700 in the M&noires of the Paris Academy ( 2 ). 
In the 1686 English edition of his “Course of Chymistry/' which was based 
on the fifth French edition, there is no mention of the evolution of any 
flammable or explosive gas when “vitriol of Mars” is prepared by dissolv- 
ing iron in dilute sulfuric acid. At that time, L&nery merely observed 
that “the liquor heats and boils considerably” { 45 ). In the eleventh French 
edition, however, which was published in 1716, a year after L&nery’s death, 
the same preparation is described as yielding “white vapors which will rise 
to the top of the neck of the matrass; if one presents a lighted candle to 



Johann Joachim Bechbr 
1636-1682 

German chemist and physician. 
Founder of the phlogiston theory. 
His experiments on minerals are de- 
scribed in his “ Physica Subterranean 
Stahl summarized his views on com- 
bustion in a book entitled “Specimen 
Becherianum.” 


84 Discovery of the Elements 

the mouth of this vessel, the Vapor will immediately take fire and at the 
same time produce a violent, shrill fulrrination” (45). In this reaction 
Ldmery believed he had found the cause of thunder and lightning. In the 
posthumous 1701 edition of Turquet de Mayerne’s complete works, the 
flammability of the gas is mentioned (2). 

The name most closely associated with the early history of hydrogen 
is that of Mr. Henry Cavendish. Although he was a descendant of the 
Dukes of Devonshire and the Dukes of Kent, he was born at Nice; for his 

mother, Lady Anne Cavendish, had 
gone to France for the benefit of the 
mild climate. The date of his birth 
is given as October 10, 1731. The un- 
fortunate death of Lady Cavendish 
two years later, and the consequent 
lack of maternal affection in the young 
child's life may account in some degree 
for the abnormal shyness and ungre- 
gariousness of the man. At the age 
of eleven years Henry Cavendish en- 
tered Dr. Newcome’s school at Hack- 
ney, and from 1749 to 1753 he attended 
Cambridge University. Although he 
lacked only a few days of the necessary 
residence requirements, he left Cam- 
bridge without receiving a degree (3). 

During his father’s lifetime Caven- 
dish lived on a meager allowance, 
but, upon his father's death in 1783, 
he received an enormous inheritance. 
Not long after this an aunt died, 
leaving him another large legacy. 
Thus he became, as Biot said, “the 
richest of all the learned and the most 
learned of all the rich” (4). Since 
Cavendish lived very modestly, the 
interest on his money accumulated until, at the time of his death, he was 
the largest depositor in the Bank of England (5). 

It may be said without exaggeration that, of all great personages of 
scientific history, Mr. Henry Cavendish was the most singular. He was shy 
and awkward among strangers, and to him aU men were strangers. The 
only social contacts he ever made were at the meetings of the Royal 
Society and at the Sunday evening receptions which Sir Joseph Banks was 
accustomed to give for the scientists in London. Cavendish spoke falter- 4 



Henry Cavendish 
1731-1810 

English chemist and physicist. This 
is the Alexander portrait . The likeness 
of Cavendish in W. Walker's engraving 
of British scientists was taken from 
the drawing by Tomlinson (46). Cav- 
endish was the first to distinguish hy- 
drogen from other gases and was an 
independent discoverer of nitrogen. 



Henry Cavendish 


85 


ingly in shrill tones and was unable to converse with more than one person 
at a time; yet, because of his broad knowledge and clear reasoning, the 
members of the Royal Society all recognized him as a superior. Dr. 
Thomas Thomson in his well-known "History of Chemistry" cites a strik- 
ing example of Cavendish’s extreme fear of publicity. Dr. Ingenhousz 
once brought as his guest to the home of Sir Joseph Banks a distinguished 
Austrian scientist, whom he introduced to Cavendish with extravagant 
praise. The foreign guest, in turn, became profuse in his flattery of 
Cavendish, stating that he had come to London with the express purpose of 



From Edward Smith’s “ Life of Sir Joseph Banks " 


Lady Banks Sir Joseph Banks 

(From a Wedgwood cameo, attributed to Flaxman.) 

Sir Joseph Banks , 1743-1820. English naturalist and collector of plants and insects. 
President of the Royal Society from 1778-1820. His collections of books and natural 
history specimens were bequeathed to the British Museum. Lady Banks used to 
assist him in giving frequent receptions for the scientists of London. 


meeting such a distinguished scientist, whereupon Cavendish, at first em- 
barrassed, then utterly confused, darted through the crowd to his waiting 
carriage (5). > 

A few scientists, however, knew how to overcome his extreme diffidence, 
and of these perhaps the most successful was Dr. Wollaston. "The way 
to talk to Cavendish," said he, "is never to look at him, but to talk as it 
were into vacancy, and then it is not unlikely but you may set him going" 
( 6 ). 

In spite of his love of solitude, Cavendish was not lacking in interest in 


86 


Discovery op the Elements 


the researches made by others. He presented yoting Humphry Davy with 
some platinum for his experiments, and went occasionally to the Royal 
Institution to see his brilliant experiments on the decomposition of the 
alkalies (6). Sir Humphry said later in his eulogy of Cavendish, 

Upon all subjects of science he was luminous and profound; 

and in discussion wonderfully acute His name will be an object 

of more veneration in future ages than at the present moment. 
Though it was unknown in the busy scenes of life, or in the popular 

discussions of 
the day, it will 
remato illustri- 
ous in *the an- 
nals of science, 
which are as im- 
perishable as 
that nature to 
Wiich they be- 
long; and it will 
be an immortal 
honour to his 
house, to his 
age, and to his 
country (7). 

Cavendish dressed 
like an English 
gentleman of a by- 
gone day. He wore 
a-l!$&ed hat and a 
gray-green coat with 
a high collar and 
frilled cuffs. His 
costume and person- 
ality are well depicted 
in the famous Alex- 

Prom Thorpe's ** Scientific Papers of the Hon . Henry Cavendish' ander portrait, 

Cavendish's House at Clapham sketched hastily at 

a dinner without 

Cavendish’s knowledge. Cavendish had three residences: one near the 
British Museum, furnished mainly with books and apparatus; another in 
Dean Street, Soho, containing his main library, which he generously placed 
at the disposal of all scholars who wished to use it; and a third dwelling 
known as Cavendish House, Clapham Common. This suburban home at 
Clapham, his favorite residence, he converted almost entirely into work- 
shops and laboratories (8). 

Although many historians of chemical progress mention Cavendish as 




Hydrogen and Nitrogen 


87 


the discoverer of hydrogen, he himself made no such claim and prefaced his 
remarks on the explosibility of a mixture of hydrogen and air with the 
words, “. . .it has been observed by others. . .” He was, however, the first 
to collect gases over mercury (41 ) and distinguish hydrogen from other gases 
by the descriptive term, “inflammable air from the metals.” His accurate 
description of its properties and his methods of obtaining the pure gas from 
different sources were scientific contributions of the first rank. He had, how- 


ever, the mistaken idea that the hydro- 
gen came from the metal rather than 
from the acid (9). He at first identi- 
fied hydrogen with phlogiston, but 
later thought it was a compound of 
phlogiston and water. 

Cavendish's death was as lonely as 
his life. He lived to the age of 
seventy-nine years, and then, one day, 
feeling the approach of death, he 
asked an attendant servant to leave 
the room and not return until a speci- 
fied time. When the servitor re- 
turned, he found his great master dead 
(10). Mr. Henry Cavendish was 
given the honor of a public funeral 
and burial in All Hallows Church 
near the tomb of his philanthropic 
ancestor, Elizabeth Hardwicke. He 
lived a blameless life, unselfishly de- 
voted to the advancement of science. 
His researches included electricity, 
astronomy, meteorology, and chem- 
istry, and he was also well versed in 
mathematics, mining, metallurgy, and \ 
the fullest sense of the word. 



From Ramsay* s “The Gases 
of the Atmosphere ** 

Danibl Rutherford, 1749-1819 


Scottish physician, botanist, and 
chemist. Discoverer of nitrogen. 
Professor of botany at Edinburgh. 
President of the Royal College of Phy- 
sicians of Edinburgh. 

flogy. He was a great scientist in 


Nitrogen 

The discovery of nitrogen was announced in a doctor’s dissertation by 
Daniel Rutherford, uncle of Sir Walter Scott (11),* (40). He was a son of 
Dr. John Rutherford, one of the founders of the Medical School at Edin- 
burgh, and was born in that city on November 3, 1749. Preparatory to 
entering his father’s profession, he graduated from the Arts course at the 
University of Edinburgh, and on September 12, 1772, he received the 
degree of doctor of medicine. His dissertation was the result of a research 
suggested and directed by the famous Scottish chemist, Dr. Joseph Black. 


88 


Discovery of the Elements 


Dr. Black had noticed that when a carbonaceous substance was burned, a 
certain amount of air remained even after the “fixed air” (carbon dioxide) 
had all been absorbed by caustic potash. He therefore gave to Rutherford 
the problem of studying the properties of this residual “air” (12), (38). 

Rutherford found that when a mouse was left in a confined volume of air 
until it died, one-sixteenth of the volume disappeared; and that when the 
remaining air was treated with alkali, it, in turn, lost one-eleventh of its 

volume. After thus remov- 
ing the carbon dioxide (“fixed, 
or mephitic, air”) and most 
of the oxygen, he studied the 
properties of the residual gas. 
He found it very difficult “to 
completely saturate air with 
phlogiston” (to remove all 
the oxygen), for after a mouse 
had died in it, a candle would 
bum feebly, and after the 
flame had flickered out, the 
candle wick or phosphorus 
would continue to glow. His 
best results were obtained by 
burning phosphorus in the 
confined air. Since the resid- 
ual gas did not support life, 
he called it “noxious,” or in- 
jurious, air. He did not rea- 
lize, however, that his “nox- 
ious air,” or nitrogen, as it is 
now called, is the constituent 
of the atmosphere that re- 
mains after removal of the 
oxygen and carbon dioxide. 
He thought that the “nox- 
ious air” was atmospheric air 
that had taken up phlogiston from the substance that had been burned. 
According to Rutherford, “ . . . this conjecture is confirmed by the fact 
that air which has served for the calcination of metals is similar, and has 
clearly taken away from them their phlogiston.” He thought that the 
“mephitic air” obtained by burning carbonaceous material contained less 
phlogiston than the “noxious air” remaining after combustion of phos- 
phorus^ Rutherford’s epoch-making thesis, “ Dissertatio Inauguralis de 
Aare fixo dicta, aut mepMHco t >f is preserved in the British Museum (12), 



Courtesy Lyman C. Newell 

Joseph Black, 1728-1799 
Scottish chemist, physicist, and physician. 
Professor of chemistry at Glasgow. He dis- 
covered carbon dioxide (“fixed air”), and dis- 
tinguished between magnesia and lime. He dis- 
covered the latent heats of fusion and va- 
porization, measured the specific heats of many 
substances, and invented an ice calorimeter. 


Nitrogen and Oxygen 89 

(39) and at the University of Edinburgh and has been translated into 
English. 

After completing his medical course, Dr. Rutherford traveled for three 
years in England, France, and Italy. Upon returning to Edinburgh in 1775 
he began his medical practice, and never again engaged in chemical 
research. Eleven years later he accepted the chair of botany at Edinburgh, 
but continued to practice medicine . He served for a time as president of the 
Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. Dr. Rutherford had a pleasant 
disposition, and displayed true loyalty and friendship toward his honored 
teacher, Dr. Black {12). 

Although most authorities agree that Dr. Rutherford was the discoverer 
of nitrogen, it would be unfair to disregard the work of Scheele, Cavendish, 
and Priestley. Scheele obtained nitrogen at about the same time by ab- 
sorbing the oxygen of the atmosphere in liver of sulfur or a mixture of sulfur 
and iron filings {13). One of Cavendish’s papers, written before 1772 and 
marked in his handwriting “communicated to Dr. Priestley,” describes 
his method of preparing “burnt air” by passing atmospheric air repeatedly 
over red-hot charcoal, and then removing the carbon dioxide by absorbing 
it in caustic potash. He studied the properties of nitrogen carefully, as 
shown by this accurate description: “The specific gravity of this air was 
found to differ very little from that of common air; of the two it seemed 
rather lighter. It extinguished flame, and rendered common air unfit for 
making bodies burn in the same manner as fixed air, but in a less degree, as 
a candle which burnt about 80" in pure common air, and which went out 
immediately in common air mixed with 8 /m of fixed air burnt about 26" in 
common air mixed with the same portion of this burnt air” {14). It is 
probable that Rutherford was unacquainted with Priestley’s earlier work 
on nitrogen {38), {39). 

In his “Simple Bodies of Chemistry,” David Low, as late as 1848, ex- 
pressed a belief in the compound nature of nitrogen, based on the curious 
reasoning that, since ammonia is derived from the organic kingdom, it must 
contain carbon, and that therefore nitrogen must consist of carbon and 
oxygen {49). 

Oxygen 

“ When Air's pure essence joins the vital flood , 

And with phosphoric Acid dyes the blood, 

Your Virgin Trains the transient Heat dispart , 

And lead the soft combustion round the heart; 

Life's holy lamp with fires successive feed, 

From the crown'd forehead to the prostrate weed , 

From Earth's proud realms to all that swim or sweep 
The yielding ether or tumultuous deep . 

You swell the bulb beneath the heaving lawn , 

Brood ike Um seed , unfold the bursting spawn; 



90 


Discovery of the Elements 


Nurse with soft lap , and warm with fragrant breath 
The embryon panting in the arms of Death; 

Youth's vivid eye with living light adorn , 

And fire the rising blush of Beauty's golden morn" (50). 


Many books have been written about the discovery of oxygen. The 
Orientalist, Heinrich Julius Klaproth, a son of the famous German chemist ,. 
Martin Heinrich Klaproth, found a. reference to this gas in a Chinese book 
written by Mao-Kh6a about the middle of the eighth century after Christ. 

Mao-Kh6a believed that the atmos- 
phere is composed of two substances: 
Y&nn, or complete air (nitrogen), and 
Yne, or incomplete air (oxygen). 
Ordinary air can be made more perfect 
byrusing metals, sulfur, or carbon to 
rob it of part of its Yne. He said that 
when these substances burn in air, 
they combine with the Yne, which, 
according to Mao-Khoa, never occurs 
free, but is present in certain minerals 
and in saltpeter, from which it can 
be driven out by heating (25), (34). 
Signor Muccioli (36), however, has 
questioned the authenticity of this 
Chinese manuscript. 
iJ The first European to state that air 
is not an element was the versatile 
artist-scientist, Leonardo da Vinci 
(1452-1519) . Leonardo, keen observer 
that he was, noticed that air is con- 
sumed in respiration and combustion, 
but that it is not completely consumed 
(15), (35). 

Robert Hooke (16), in his famous 
book “Micrographia” published in 
1665, gave a complete theory of combustion. He thought that air contains 
a substance (oxygen) that exists in solid form in saltpeter, and a larger 
quantity of an inert substance (nitrogen). Dr. John Mayow, when only 
thirty-three years of age, explained combustion by saying that air contains 
a Spiritus nitro-aereus (oxygen), a gas that is consumed in respiration and 
burning, with the result that substances no longer burn in the air that is 
left. He thought that his Spiritus was present in saltpeter, and stated that it 
existed, not in the alkaline part of the salt, but in the add part. According 
to Dr. Mayow, all acids contain the Spiritus , and all animals absorb it into , 



From Jean Paul Richter’s “ Leonardo ” 

Leonardo da Vinci 
1452-1519 

{From a drawing in red chalk by 
himself. In the Royal Library, Turin.) 
Italian artist, sculptor, anatomist, and 
scientist of the first rank. Pioneer in 
mechanics and aeronautics. The first 
European to recognize that the atmos- 
phere contains at least two constituents. 


Oxygen 


91 


their blood as they breathe (17). T. S. Patterson, however, who has made 
an exhaustive study of Dr. Mayow’s writings, believes that his contribu- 
tions to the theory bf combustion have been greatly over-estimated (18). 

The first person to prepare oxygen by heating saltpeter was Ole Borfch, 
but he did not know how to collect it (19). He stated in 1678 that it did 
not burn but that it made charcoal burn very vigorously (51). In his 
“Prominent Danish Scientists,” V. Meisen shows a facsimile of the intro- 
duction to Borch’s “Nitrum non inflammari,” which was published in 
volume five of Thomas Bartholin's A eta Medica; 1 ‘In a little book Naturalis 
Historic Nitri (Authore Guilielmo Clarcke Anglo, Francofurti et Hamburg 



From Gunther's "Early Science in Oxford ,** Vol. 7 

Robert Hooke’s Home, Montague House, Which Afterward Became the First 
Home of the British Museum 


1675.8°. p. 13), a man of learning says: ‘Saltpetre is ignitible, because ex- 
perience shows that if a small piece of it is cast into a fire, it is ignited at 
once and bums, leaving a rest of lime or ash. It catches fire suddenly and 
blazes lively; and it burns downwards, whereas ordinarily fire always burns 
upwards.* In numberless experiments I have however found nothing of the 
kind . . .” (52). 

William Clarke’s “Treatise on the Natural History of Nitre” was first 
published in London in 1670. A Latin translation of it was issued in 1675. 
Borch was a great physician, botanist, chemist, philologist, and historian 
of science who bequeathed all his property to the University of Copenhagen 




92 


Discovery of the Elements 


for the erection and maintenance of Borch’s Collegium, a dormitory for 
students deserving of financial aid ( 52 ). Stephen Hales also prepared 
oxygen from saltpeter and collected it over water, but thought he had 
ordinary air; he did not believe in the existence of a “vivifying spirit' ' in 
the atmosphere (19). In April, 1774, there appeared in Abb6 Rozier's 
Journal de Physique a remarkable paper by Pierre Bayen, a pharmacist 

who later became a medical in- 
spector in the armies of the 
French Republic. In discuss- 
ing his experiments with mer- 
curic oxide, Bayen stated that, 
when mercury is calcined, it 
does not lose phlogiston, but 
combines with a gas and in- 
creases in weight. He thus 
rejected the phlogiston theory 
three years before it was 
proved false by Lavoisier (20). 

Bayen, however, like all his 
predecessors who had handled 
oxygen, neglected to make a 
thorough study of its properties 
and failed to recognize it as a 
new substance. AS Patterson 
says, he . . cannot therefore 
be regarded as having dis- 
covered it, and this applies 
with greater force to other un- 
conscious preparations of oxy- 
gen by Hales and possibly by 
Robert Boyle, and, of course, 
still more strongly to the vague 
speculations of Hooke and 
Mayow" (18). 

Most chemists agree that 
the actual discovery of oxygen 
was made independently at 
about the same time by Priestley in England and Scheele in Sweden. 
Priestley's results, to be sure, were published before those of Scheele, but 
Scheele's publisher had been inexcusably negligent. The question of 



Courtesy E. R. Riegel 
1641-1679 

English chemist and physician, who died quite 
young. Famous for his early researches on com- 
bustion and respiration. His theory of combus- 
tion was described in his tract entitled (t De Sale 
Nitro et Spirito Nitro-aereo” in 1674 (48). 


The Stuart Portrait of Joseph Priestley, 1733-1804 

“Oh what an active brain had he , 

And clear discriminating mind. 

Through life his great desire was this: 

To bless and elevate mankind” (54). 



94 


Discovery of the Elements 


Joseph Priestley was born in Fieldhead, a tiny hamlet near Leeds, on 
March 13 (old style), 1733, and was therefore about one and one-half 
years older than that other great pioneer in pneumatic chemistry, Mr. 
Henry Cavendish. Although Priestley and Cavendish had similar scientific 
interests, their lives and personalities offered the greatest possible contrast. 
Since Priestley’s mother died when he was only six years old, he was en- 
trusted to the care of an aunt, 
Mrs, Keighley, of whom he 
afterward said that she ‘‘knew 
no other use of wealth, or of 
talents of any kind, than to 
do good” (21). 

At the age of nineteen years 
he was sent to the Dissenting 
Academy at Daventry to be 
educated for the liberal minis- 
try. After completing the 
three-year course, he minis- 
tered to congregations at 
Needham Market and later 
at Nantwich, but with small 
success. In 1761 he received 
an appointment as teacher of 
languages in the Dissenting 
Academy at Warrington, and 
taught Latin, Greek, French, 
Italian, oratory, and civil law. 
Although these subjects were 
only distantly related to the 
science in which he later won 
undying fame, Priestley’s 
scientific spirit manifested it- 
self even here — he encouraged 
absolute freedom of speech 
Title Page of Bayen’s " Opuscules Chimiques” among his students. 

Even when struggling with 
poverty at Nantwich, Priestley loved to make experiments; and from his 
meager salary he purchased an air-pump and an electrical machine. In 
1766 an event occurred that caused him to devote the rest of his life to 
scientific research. That event was his introduction to the great American 
statesman and scientist, Benjamin Franklin. Not long after this meeting, 
Priestley accepted a pastorate at Leeds. Since the parsonage happened to 
be located next door to the Jakes and Nell Brewery, the Reverend Mr. 





From Priestley's “ Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air," 1774 and 1790 

See references (9) and {22) 

Priestley’s Apparatus for Studying the Composition of the Atmosphere 


Fig. 1, a, Earthenware pneumatic trough, 8* deep; bb , flat stones, which in his later 
wooden trough were replaced by a shelf for holding the jars; cc, jars, 10* X 2 1 //, for 
collecting gases; d f tall beer glass containing enough air to sustain a mouse for from 20 
to 30 minutes, and “something on which it may conveniently sit, out of reach of the 
water.” The mouse was introduced by passing it quickly through the water; e, 
gas generator heated by a candle or a red-hot poker. 

Fig. 2, “Pots and tea-dishes” to slide under the gas-filled jars when removing them 
from the trough. 

Fig. 3, Receiver for keeping the mice alive. It was open at top and bottom, ex- 
cept for plates of perforated tin, the lower of which stood on a wooden frame to permit 
circulation of air. To avoid chilling the mice, this receiver was kept on a shelf over the 
kitchen fireplace. 

Fig. 4, Cork for closing a phial of solid or liquid which must be transferred, without 
wetting the contents, to a jar of gas in the pneumatic trough. 

Fig. 5, Wire stand for supporting a gallipot inside a jar of gas. 

Fig. 0, Funnel for “pouring air” into a glass jar by displacement of water. 

Fig. 11, Glass cylinder for admitting a candle to test the ability of the gas to support 
combustion. 

Fig. 12, a , Wax candle, bent for introducing it into a vessel, with the flame upward; 
b , wire; c , candle to be held under a jar standing in water. It was removed the instant 
the flame was extinguished, to avoid contamination of the gas in the iar with smoke. 




Frontispiece of Priestley’s " Observations on Different Kinds of Air,” 1774 and 1790 

See references (9) and (22) 

Priestley’s Laboratory 

Fig. 7, Apparatus for expelling gas from solids. The fireplace was used for heating 
a gun barrel containing dry sand which had previously been ignited. The open end 
of the gun barrel was luted to the stem of a tobacco pipe leading to a trough of mercury. 

Fig. 8, a. Trough containing an inverted cylinder, b, of mercury; c, a phial contain- 
ing substances from which a gas may be liberated; d, glass trap to intercept moisture. 

Fig. 9, Bladder for transferring gases. It contained a bent glass tube at one end 
and at the other a one-hole cork to admit a funnel. After the gas had been admitted, 
the bladder was tied tightly with string. 

Fig. 10, a, Apparatus for impregnating a fluid with gas; b, bowl containing a quan- 
tity of the same fluid; c, phial containing chalk, cream of tartar, or pearlash, and dilute 
sulfuric acid for generating carbon dioxide; d, flexible leather tube, which permitted 
Priestley to shake the gas generator, c, 

Fig. 13, Siphon. 

' Fig. 14, Evacuated bell jar. 

Fig. 15, Apparatus for measuring small quantities of gas in his experiments with 
‘’nitrous air” (nitric oxide), o, small glass tube; b, wire; c, sharply bent, thin plate 
of iron for withdrawing the wire. This little apparatus was introduced under water 
into a jar of nitric oxide, and when the wire was withdrawn, nitric oxide took its place. 
Priestley measured the lengths of the columns of air, of nitric oxide, and of the resulting 
nitrogen peroxide after admixture. 

Fig. 16, Apparatus for taking the electric spark in any kind of gas. a t Mercury 
column; b, brass knob. 

Figs. 17, 18, and 19 are different forms of apparatus for taking the electric spark in 
gases. Fig. 19 represents a mercury-filled siphon containing an iron wire, aa, in each 
leg. Any gas which was introduced would rise to bb, the upper part of the siphon. The 
mercury basins could be made part of an electric circuit. 



97 


Joseph Priestley 

Priestley had a convenient source of “fixed air" for his experiments. He 
soon discovered the pleasant taste of water charged with this gas, and 
recommended the refreshing beverage to his friends. Dr. William Brown- 
rigg had previously made the same discovery (22), (47) . 

Inspired by Priestley’s illuminating experiments with oxygen, carbon 
dioxide, and other gases, the great Spanish physicist, historian, and poet, 
Father Jos6 de Viera y Clavijo (1738-1799), praised him in a long poem. 
Although the following prose 
translation of an excerpt 
from it cannot render justice 
to the poetry, it nevertheless 
illustrates an early intellec- 
tual bond between the scien- 
tists of Spain, Italy, England, 
and the United States of 
America. 

“If by His mandate Torricelli 
Poised air's vast sea in slender 
tube , 

Newton with his wondrous 
prism 

Dawn's seven rays dissected 
out , 

Jove's thunder and Heaven's 
ether 

Yielded to Franklin's rod , 

God also guided Priestley when 
He said: 

Take thou this earth , take from 
it the fixed air" (53).* 

From 1772 to 1779 Priest- 
ley served as literary com- Dedication of Priestley’s “Experiments 
_ , „ and Observations on Different Kinds of 

panion to Lord Shelburne. Air,” 1774 

His most important chemical 

experiments, culminating in the discovery of oxygen, were made during 
this period, and his book entitled “Experiments and Observations on 
Different Kinds of Air" was therefore affectionately dedicated to Lord 
Shelburne. In 1780 Priestley became minister to adarge metropolitan con- 

* "Si 61 hizo d Torricelli que pesos e 
En tubo estrecko el mar de la atmosfera; 

Que Newton con un prisma disecase 
Los siete rayos de la luz primera; 

Que Franklin con su barra le robase 
El rayo d Jove , el Eter d la esfera; 

TambiSn gu%6 d Priestley \ quando le dixo: 

Toma esa tierra, saca el Ayre fixo . . (53). 





98 


Discovery of the Elements 


gregation in Birmingham. Here he was contented in his ministry and 
happy in his association with such men as James Watt, Josiah Wedgwood, 
and Erasmus Darwin at the meetings of the Lunar Society, which met on 
the first Monday evening after each full moon in order that the members 
might find their way home through the unlighted streets. At Birmingham 
he completed his six- volume work on “Different Kinds of Air,” which was 
later abridged to three volumes. 

The struggles of the American and French revolutionists aroused 
Priestley's sympathy, and he was no dissembler. On July 14, 1791, about 
eighty persons had a dinner at a Birmingham hotel in observance of the 
second anniversary of the fall of the Bastille. A mob shattered the win- 
dows with stones. Although Priestley did not attend the dinner, his politi- 
cal views were well known. The fanatics broke up the meeting at the hotel, 
surged through the streets of Birmingham, burned Priestley's church, 
home, and library, and shattered his apparatus. Even then their thirst for 



From Zekert’s “Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Sein Lehen und seine Werke ’* 
Stralsund, the Birthplace of Scheele* 


violence was not satiated, and furious rioting continued for three days. 
Before the dragoons were at last able to disperse the mob and restore order, 
the homes and churches of many dissenters had become charred ruins {23). 

With the aid of friends, the Priestley family escaped without personal 
injury. After three unhappy years in London, they finally succeeded in 
collecting a small indemnity from the British Government, and emigrated 
to America (23). Priestley's last days were spent in the peaceful town of 
Northumberland, Pennsylvania, where he worked without interference at 
his beloved experiments (33). He died on February 6, 1804, and was 
buried in the Quaker cemetery at Northumberland. 

Since Priestley found that some gases can be collected over water while 
others require mercury (41), he concluded that there must be different 
kinds of “airs." On August 1, 1774, he heated mercuric oxide with a burn- 
ing glass, liberated a gas, “dephlogisticated air" (oxygen), and collected it 

* Reproduced by kind permission of Mr. Arthur Nemayer, Bucbdruckerei und 
Veriag, Mittenwald, Bavaria. 





Priestley and Scheele 


99 


over water. In an atmosphere of this gas, substances burned more brilliantly 
than in air. Five years later he tested the respirability of his “dephlogisti- 
cated air” by mixing it with nitric oxide over water. He found that much 
more nitric oxide was required to render a given volume of “dephlogisticated 
air” unfit for a mouse to breathe than for an equal volume of atmospheric 
air. His description of the experiment is charmingly naive : 


My reader will not wonder 
that, after having ascertained 
the superior goodness of dephlo- 
gisticated air by mice living in 
it, and the other tests above 
mentioned, I should have the 
curiosity to taste it myself. I 
have gratified that curiosity by 
breathing it, drawing it through 
a glass syphon, and by this 
means I reduced a large jar full 
of it to the standard of common 
air. The feeling of it to my 
lungs was not sensibly different 
from that of common air, but I 
fancied that my breast felt pe- 
culiarly light and easy for some 
time afterwards. Who can tell 
but that, in time, this pure air 
may become a fashionable 
article in luxury? Hitherto 
only two mice and myself have 
had the privilege of breathing 
it (24). 

On the one hundredth anniversary 
of the discovery of oxygen, a large 
audience assembled in Birmingham 
for the unveilingof a statue of Joseph 
Priestley, and an eloquent eulogy 
and biographical sketch was de- 
livered by Thomas Huxley (25). 



From Zekert's "C. W. Scheele, 

Sein Leben und seine Werhe ” 

Youthful Portrait of Carl Wilhelm 
Scheele, 1742 - 1786 * 

Swedish pharmacist and chemist. In- 
dependent discoverer of oxygen. He dis- 
covered arsenic acid, distinguished between 
nitric and nitrous acids, demonstrated 
the presence of tartaric, citric, malic, 
and gallic acids in plants, and discovered 
lactic and uric acids in the animal realm. 


At the same time the scientists of Leeds assembled at Priestley’s birth- 
place and the chemists of America gathered at his grave near the banks of 
the Susquehanna to honor his memory (26). The meeting in Pennsylvania 
was memorable not only because it marked the centennial of the discovery 
of oxygen but also because it resulted in the founding of the American 
Chemical Society. 

Carl Wilhelm Scheele was born on December 9, 1742, in Stralsund, then 

• Reproduced by kind permission of Mr. Arthur Nemayer, Buchdruckerei und 
Verlag, Mittenwald, Bavaria. 


100 Discovery of the Elements 

the capital of Swedish Pomerania. He was the seventh child in a family 
of eleven, and, since the family was not as rich in worldly goods as in 
children, he was apprenticed at the age of fourteen years to an apothe- 
cary named Bauch. Like other pharmacists of his time, Bauch prepared 
his own medicines from the crude drugs and was well versed in chemistry. 
In his laboratory were to be found many inorganic salts, the mineral acids, 
a few ores, rock-crystal, phosphorus, sulfur, benzoic acid, and camphor. 

His chemical library included 
the works of Boerhaave, L6m- 
ery, Kunckel, and Neumann 
(27). The fourteen-year-old 
apprentice soon developed a 
passion for reading chemical 
books and repeating the experi- 
ments described in them. His 
memory for chemical facts was 
so great that, after reading a 
book through once or twice, he 
had no need to consult it again. 

In 1768 Scheele took charge 
of the Scharenberg pharmacy 
in Stockholm, and at about the 
same time he met with bitter 
disappointment at the hands 
of the Stockholm Academy, 
which rejected two of his 
earliest papers because of the 
unmethodical style in which 
they were written. The editor 
who refused them was Torbem 
Bergman, who afterward be- 
came Scheele’s lifelong friend 
(27 ) . In 1773 Scheele accepted 
a position in Lokk’s pharmacy 
at Upsala. One day Lokk 
noticed that saltpeter which 
has been fused for some time remains neutral, but evolves red fumes when 
treated with vinegar. Assessor Gahn, the famous mineralogist who 
discovered manganese, was unable to explain the change, and Bergman, 
the illustrious professor of chemistry at Upsala, could give him no help. 
Scheele, however, readily explained that there are two “spirits of niter/’ or, 
as one says today, $wo acids, nitric and nitrous. 

Gahn and Scheele became close friends, and much of their correspondence 



From Grimaux’s “ Lavoisier ” 
From the Painting by David 

M. and Mme. Lavoisier 

In 1777 Lavoisier gave quantitative proof of the 
incorrectness of the phlogiston theory. Shortly 
after Priestley and Scheele discovered oxygen, 
Lavoisier gave the true explanation of combustion 
and respiration. Berthollet, Guyton-Morveau, 
Fourcroy, and Klaproth were among the first to 
accept the new views. 


Carl Wilhelm Scheele 


101 


has been preserved. It was through Gahn that Scheele made the acquaint- 
ance of Bergman. When Scheele explained that potassium nitrate is 
converted by fusion into the deliquescent salt, potassium nitrite, Berg- 
man became deeply interested in the young chemist, and they, too, formed 
a lasting friendship. Bergman received much of his practical instruction 
from Scheele, while Scheele’s intellectual interests were broadened by his 
long association with the scholarly Bergman {27). 

In spite of many offers from 
universities, Scheele never ex- 
changed the practice of phar- 
macy for an academic career. 

The pharmacies of his day were 
quiet centers of original re- 
search, and as Scheele himself 
once said to Assessor Gahn, 

“ ... To explain new phenom- 
ena, that is my task; and 
how happy is the scientist 
when he finds what he so dili- 
gently sought, a pleasure that 
gladdens the heart” {28). 

His most brilliant discoveries 
were made at the Lokk phar- 
macy. His notebooks, which 
have since been edited and 
published by Baron Norden- 
skiold, show that he prepared 
oxygen in 1771 and 1772, that 
is to say, at least two years 
before Priestley did. Scheele 
made it by heating silver car- 
bonate, mercuric carbonate, 
mercuric oxide, niter, and mag- 
nesium nitrate, and by distilling a mixture of manganese dioxide and 
arsenic acid. When oxygen is prepared by heating silver or mercuric car- 
bonate, the carbon dioxide must be absorbed in caustic alkali. 

The results of these experiments were discussed in the book, ‘Tire and 
Air,” which Scheele sent to his publisher, Swederus, near the end of 1775, 
but the book did not appear until 1777. In August, 1776, Scheele, ex- 
asperated at the delay, wrote dejectedly to Bergman, “I have thought for 
some time back, and I am now more than ever convinced, that the greater 
number of my laborious experiments on fire will be repeated, possibly in a 
somewhat different manner, by others, and that their work will be pub- 



A Statue of Lavoisier Which Formed Part 
of the French Exhibit at the San Francisco 
Exposition in 1915 


Discovery of the Elements 


1Q2 

lished sooner than my own, which is concerned also with air. It will then 
be said that my experiments are taken, it may be in a slightly altered form, 
from their writings. I have Swederus to thank for all this” (29). Scheele’s 
discovery of oxygen was anticipated, as he had feared, but he is universally 
recognized as an independent discoverer of that gas. 

In 1776 he became a pro visor of the pharmacy at Koping, a little town 
on the north shore of Lake Malar. The owner, Heinrich Pohl, had died, 
leaving the shop to his young widow. Instead of finding the prosperous 
business he had expected, Scheele met the discouraging task of freeing the 
estate from heavy debt (27), but he finally placed the business on a sound 
financial basis and purchased it from the widow Pohl. By 1 782 his name 
was known to all European scientists, and his financial condition permitted 
him to build a new home and a well-equipped laboratory. One of his 
sisters and Mrs. Pohl kept house for him. 

The last years of his life were filled with intense suffering from rheuma- 
tism. When he realized that death was near, he married the widow Pohl 
in order that the estate which he had struggled so hard to save might return 
to her. He died two days later on May 21, 1786, at the age of forty-three 
years. His entire life had been devoted to chemistry, and in one of his let- 
ters to Gahn one may read, “ Diese edel Wissenschaft ist mein Auge ”* (30). 

Scheele was a phlogistonist to the end of his life, and thought that 
phlogiston was similar to the imponderable ether of the physicists and that 
hydrogen was a compound of phlogiston and “matter of heat.” It has 
been shown that certain seventeenth-century chemists were ahead of most 
eighteenth-century scientists in their understanding of the composition of 
the atmosphere and the nature of combustion and respiration. Even the 
three men who had contributed most toward an understanding of the at- 
mosphere — namely, Cavendish, Priestley, and Scheele — clung to the end of 
their days to the outgrown phlogiston theory. 

The great French scientist, Lavoisier, would have liked very much to be 
considered an independent discoverer of oxygen, but he himself may have 
felt the weakness of his claim. He wrote in his il M6moire sur VEocistence de 
VAir dans VAcide Nitreux ,” read on April 20, 1776, “Perhaps, strictly 
speaking, there is nothing in it of which Mr. Priestley would not be able to 
claim the original idea; but as the same facts have conducted us to dia- 
metrically opposite results, I trust that, if I am reproached for having 
borrowed my proofs from the works of this celebrated philosopher, my right 
at least to the conclusions will not be contested” (31). In his remarkable 
paper “On the Nature of the Principle That Combines with Metals during 
Their Calcination and Increases Their Weight, ’ ’ which he had read during the 
Easter season of 1775, he had announced that this principle is simply “the 
purest and most salubrious part of the air; so that if the air which has been 

♦ "This noble science is my guide." 



Antoinb-Laurbnt Lavoisier 


103 


fixed in a metallic combination again becomes free, it reappears in a condi- 
tion in which it is eminently respirable and better adapted than the air of the 
atmosphere to support inflammation and the combustion of substances” 
( 32 ). 

This was the death blow to the phlogiston theory. Although Lavoisier 
discovered no elements himself, he was the first to assert that oxygen is an 
element. Moreover, his correct explanation of combustion so revolutionized 
the entire science of chemistry that, under the new stimulus, many new 
elements were discovered soon after his tragic death on the guillotine. 
For this great service scientists will always honor the name of Antoine- 
Laurent Lavoisier. 


Literature Cited 

(0 Boyle, R. f “Memoirs for a General History of the Air,” Shaw’s Abridgment of 
Boyle's Works, Vol. 3, 1725, p. 61; Sir W. Ramsay, “The Gases of the Atmos- 
phere,” Macmillan & Co., London, 1915, p. 10. 

( 2 ) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Cliemie,” part 3, Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 
1845, pp. 260-1; R. Jagnaux, “Histoire de la Chimie,” Vol. 1, Baudry et Cie., 
Paris, 1891, pp. 385-6. 

( 3 ) Wilson, G., “The Life of the Honourable Henry Cavendish Including Abstracts 
' of His More Important Scientific Papers,” printed for the Cavendish Society, 

London, 1851, p. 17. 

(4) “Biographie Universelle, Ancienne et Moderne,” 85 vols., Vol. 7, Michaud Fr£res, 

Paris, 1813, p. 456. Biographical sketch of Cavendish by Biot. 

(5) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” Vol. 1, Colburn and Bentley, 
London, 1830, pp. 336-8. 

(6) Wilson, G., “The Life of the Honourable Henry Cavendish,” ref. (3), pp. 168-9. 

(7) Davy, Dr. John, “Memoirs of the Life of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.,” Vol. 1, 
Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman, London, 1836, p. 221. 

( 8 ) Wilson, G., “The Life of the Honourable Henry Cavendish,” ref. ( 3 ), pp. 163-4. 

(9) Ibid., pp. 25-7; Alembic Club Reprint No. 3. H. Cavendish, “Experiments 
on Air,” University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1906, pp. 13-25; J. Priestley, 
"Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air,” Vol. I, Thomas 
Pearson, Birmingham, 1790, p. 5 and p. 270; T. E. Thorpe, “Scientific Papers of 
the Honourable Henry Cavendish, F.R.S.,” Vol. 2, University Press, Cambridge, 
1921, pp. 9-10; H. Cavendish, Phil. Trans., 74, 119-53 (1784). 

(10) Wilson, G., “The Life of the Honourable Henry Cavendish,” ref. (3), pp. 182-5. 

(11) Ramsay, Sir W., “Life and Letters of Joseph Black, M.D.,” Constable and Co., 
London, 1918 , p. 51. 

(12) Ramsay, Sir W., “The Gases of the Atmosphere,” ref. (2), pp. 61-7, 

(13) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. ( 2 ), Vol. 1, p. 550; Alembic Club 
Reprint No. 3. H. Cavendish, “Experiments on Air,” ref. (9), pp, 26-7; C. W. 
Scheele, “Sammtliche physische und chemische Werke,” translated into German 
by Hermbstadt, Vol. 1, zweite unveranderte Auflage, Mayer and Muller, Berlin, 
1891 , pp. 186-7. 

(14) Wilson, G„ “The Life of the Honourable Henry Cavendish,” ref. ( 3 ), p. 28, 

British Assoc. Report, 1839, pp. 64-5; Alembic Club Reprint No. 3. H. Caven- 
dish, “Experiments on Air,” ref. (9), p. 49; H. Cavendish, Phil. Trans., 75, 
372-84 (1785). ' 



104 Discovery of the Elements 

(25) JOrgensen, S. M., “Die Entdeckung des Sauerstoffes,” translated from Danish 
into German by Ortwed and Speter. Ferdinand Enke, Stuttgart, 1909, pp. 3-11. 

(70) Alembic Club Reprint No. 5, “Extracts from Micrographia,” University of 
Chicago Press, Chicago, 1902, pp. 43-7. 

(17) JOrgensen, S. M., “Die Entdeckung des Sauerstoffes,” ref. (25), pp. 8-9; 
E. Riegbl, “Four eminent chemists who died before their time,” J. Chem. 
Educ., 3, 1103-5 (Oct., 1926). 

(IS) Patterson, T. S., “John Mayow — in contemporary setting,” Isis, 15, [3], 539 
(Sept., 1931). 

(19) JOrgensen, S. M., “Die Entdeckung des Sauerstoffes,” ref. (25), pp. 12-4. 

(20) Jorgensen, S. M., “Die Entdeckung des Sauerstoffes,” ref. (25), pp. 30-3; P. 
Bayen, Rozier's Jour, de Physique , 3, 285 (Apr., 1774); P. Bayen, “Opuscules 
Chimiques,” Vol. 1, Dugour et Durand, Paris, An VI de la R6publique, p. li 
(feloge by Parmentier); ibid., p. 228. 

(21) Thorpe, T. E., “Essays in Historical Chemistry,” Macmillan & Co., London, 

1894, p. 30. 

(22) Priestley, J., “Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air,” 
J. Johnson, London, 1774, pp. 25-34. 

(23) Thorpe, T. E., “Essays in Historical Chemistry,” ref. (21), pp. 34-5. 

(24) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (2), Vol. 1, p. 399; J. PRIestley, 
“Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air,” Vol. 2, Thomas 
Pearson, Birmingham, 1790, pp. 161-2. See also, ibid., pp. 102-87. 

(25) Huxley, T., “Science and Education: Essays,” D. Appleton & Co., New York 
City, 1897, pp. 1-37. 

(26) Thorpe, T. E., “Essays in Historical Chemistry,” ref. (21), p. 28. 

(27) Ibid., pp. 56-65. 

(28) Scheble, C. W., “Nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnungen,” edited by Norden- 
skiold, Norstedt & Soner, Stockholm, 1892, p. 151. Letter of Scheele to Gahn, 
Dec. 26, 1774. 

(29) Ibid., p. 264. 

(30) Ibid., p. 165. 

(31) “Oeuvres de Lavoisier,” Vol. 2, Imprimerie Imp6riale, Paris, 1862, p. 130. 

(32) Ibid., Vol. 2, p. 127. 

(33) Smith, E. F., “Priestley in America,” P. Blakiston’s Son and Co., Philadelphia, 
1920, 173 pages; C. A. Browne, “A Half Century of Chemistry in America,” 
The American Chemical Society, Easton, Pa., 1926, pp. 3-16; S. A. Goldschmidt, 
“The birth of the American Chemical Society at the Priestley house in 1874,” 
J. Chem. Educ., 4, 145-7 (Feb., 1927); W. H. Walker, “History of the Priestley 
house and the movement for its preservation,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 150-7 (Feb., 
1927); C. A. Browne, “Priestley’s life in Northumberland and discussion of the 
Priestley relics on exhibition in the museum,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 159-71 (Feb., 
1927); L. C. Newell, “One of Priestley’s first letters written from Northumber- 
land, Pa.,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 173-5 (Feb., 1927); T. L. Davis, “Priestley’s last 
defense of phlogiston,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 176-83 (Feb., 1927); C. A. Browne, 
“Joseph Priestley as an historian of science,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 184-99 (Feb. , 
1927). 

(34) Klaproth, H. J„ “Sur les connaissances chimiques des Chinois dans le VIII 
Steele,” Mimoires de VAcad. de St. Peter sbourg, 2, 476-84 (1810). 

(35) VON Lippmann, E. O., “Abhandlungen und Vortrage zur Geschiehte der Natur- 
wissenschaften,” Veit and Co., Leipzig, 1906, Vol. 1, p. 361. 



Literature Cited 


105 


(36) MuccIoli, M., "Intorno ad una Memoria di Giulio Klaproth sulle ‘Conoscenze 
Chimiche dei Cinesi nell 1 VIII Secolo,’ ” Archeion, Archiv . di Storia della Scienza , 
7, 382-6 (Dec., 1926). 

(37) Dobbin, L., "Paracelsus and the discovery of hydrogen,” J. Chbm. Educ., 9, 
1122-4 (June 1932); M. E. Weeks, ibid., 9, 1296 (July, 1932). 

(38) Weeks, M. E., "Daniel Rutherford and the discovery of nitrogen,” ibid., 11, 
101-7 (Feb., 1934); Rev. Sci ., 72, 441-9 (July, 1934). 

(39) McKie, D., "Daniel Rutherford and the discovery of nitrogen,” Sci . Progress , 29, 
650-60 <Apr., 1935); L. Dobbin, "Daniel Rutherford’s inaugural dissertation. 
Crum Brown's translation.” J. Chem. Educ., 12, 370-5 (Aug., 1935). 

(40) Weeks, M. E., "Some scientific friends of Sir Walter Scott,” J. Chbm. Educ., 
13, 503-7, (Nov., 1936). 

(41) Speter, Max, "Wer hat zuerst Quccksilber als Sperrfiussigkeit beim Auffangen 
von Gasen verwendet?” Schweizerische Apotheker-Ztg ., 58, 123-4 (Feb., 1920). 

(42) Speter, Max, "Lavoisier und seine Vorlaufer,” F. Enke, Stuttgart, 1910, pp. 48- 
51. Chapter on Pierre Bayen. 

(43) Speter, Max, ibid., pp. 55-72, 96-108. Chapter on John Mayow; "John 
Mayow und das Schicksal seiner Lehren,” Chem.-Ztg., 34, 946-7, 953-4, 962-4 
(Sept., 1910). 

(44) "The Works of the Hon. Robert Boyle,” A. Millar, London, 1794, vol. 3, pp. 255- 
6; ibid., vol. 5, p. 111. 

(45) L£mbry, N., "A Course of Chymistry,” Walter Kettilby, London, 1686, pp. 145- 
6; ibid., Theodore Haak, Leyden, 1716, pp. 184-6. 

(46) Smith, H. M., "Eminent men of science living in 1807-8,” J. Chem. Educ., 18, 
203-5, 226 (May, 1941); W. Walker, "Memoirs of the Distinguished Men of 
Science of Great Britain Living in the Years 1807-8,” W. Walker and Son, Lon- 
don, 1862, p. 38. 

(47) Priestley, J., ref. (9), vol. 1, pp. 4-5. 

(48) McKie, D., "John Mayow, 1641-79,” Nature, 148, 728 (Dec. 13, 1941). 

(49) Low, David, "The Simple Bodies of Chemistry,” Longman, Brown, Green, and 
Longmans, London, 1848, 2nd ed., p. 85. 

(50) Darwin, Erasmus, "A Botanic Garden,” J. Johnson, London, 1791, 2nd ed., pp. 
39-40. 

(51) Jorgensen, S. M., ref. (15), p. 12. 

(52) Mbisen, V., "Prominent Danish Scientists,” Levin and Munksgaard, Copen- 
hagen, 1932, pp. 33-5. 

(53) Sempere. J., "Epsayo de Una Biblioteca Espanola de los Mejores Escritores del 
Reynado de Carlos JII,” Imprenta Real, Madrid, 1789, vol. 6, pp. 155-8. 

(54) "The Priestley centennial,” Am. Chemist, 5, 43 (Aug., Sept., 1874). Poem by 
Iambs Aiken. 



VI. DANIEL RUTHERFORD AND HIS SERVICES 
TO CHEMISTRY* 

Although the statement that nitrogen was discovered in 1772 by Daniel 
Rutherford appears in most histories of chemistry , this Scottish scientist has 
remained almost unknown to chemists. Nevertheless , the life story and per- 
sonal character of Dr. Rutherford emerge from the correspondence of his dis- 
tinguished nephew , Sir Walter Scott } in almost pleasing manner. Both Dr. 
Rutherford and his father served as physicians to the Scott family , and the 
great novelist's allusions to them combine admiration , sincere affection , and 
pardonable family pride. 

Dr. Rutherford served as professor of botany at the University of Edinburgh 
from 1786 to 1819 , and was thus contemporary with Joseph Blacky Charles 
Hope , and John Robison. He invented an ingenious maximum and mini- 
mum thermometer which is described in many modern textbooks of physics. 
The tragic circumstances surrounding his sudden death were described by Sir 
Walter in numerous letters to members of his family. 

In his doctor's thesis Rutherford made a clear distinction between nitrogen 
and carbon dioxide which most of his contemporaries had failed to observe. 
Henry Cavendish y however , had made this distinction somewhat earlier , but had 
failed to publish his results. The names of Priestley and Scheele are also 
intimately connected with the discovery of nitrogen. 


The correspondence of Sir Walter Scott, his family genealogy , and the ten- 
volume biography by his son-in-law, J. G. Lockhart, contain frequent al- 
lusions to Scott's grandfather, Dr. John Rutherford, one of the founders of 
the medical school at the University of Edinburgh, and to his uncle, Dr. 
Daniel Rutherford, who is usually regarded as the discoverer of the element 
nitrogen. In the genealogy of the Scott family one may read: 

By his first wife, Jean Swinton, Professor John Rutherford had a son, 
John, who died young, and a daughter Anne, who married f Walter 
Scott, writer to the Signet, and became the mother of Sir Walter Scott 
Bart. He married, secondly, on the 9th August, 1743, Anne 
M'Kay, by whom he had five sons and three daughters. . .Daniel Ruth- 
erford, second son of Professor John Rutherford, was born on 3rd 
November, 1749. Prosecuting medical studies at the University of 
Edinburgh, he early discovered the existence of a gaseous fluid, now 
known as nitrogen gas. . ,{1) 

Sir Walter Scott gave some of the same facts in the following passage 
from his autobiography; 

* Presented before the Division of History of Chemistry at the Washington meeting 
of the American Chemical Society, March 28, 1933. 
t A facsimile of the marriage contract is to be found in ref. (4). 

106 



Daniel Rutherford 


107 


In [April, 1758] my father married Anne Rutherford, eldest daugh- 
ter of Dr. John Rutherford, professor of medicine in the University of 
Edinburgh. He was one of those pupils of Boerhaave to whom the 
school of medicine in our northern metropolis owes its rise, and a man 
distinguished for professional talent, for lively wit, and for literary ac- 
quirements. Dr. Rutherford was twice married. His first wife, of 
whom my mother is the sole surviving child, was a daughter of Sir 
John Swinton of Swinton, a family which produced many distinguished 
warriors during the middle ages, and which, for antiquity and honour- 
able alliances, may rank with any in Britain. My grandfather's 
second wife was Miss Mackay, by whom he had a second family, of 
whom are now [1808] alive, Dr. Daniel Rutherford, professor of botany 
in the University of Edinburgh, and Misses Janet and Christian 
Rutherford, amiable and accomplished women. . .(2) 


As might be expected, the Rutherfords, both father and son, served as 
physicians to the Scott family. When Sir Walter was only eighteen months 
old, his right leg became paralyzed, and, after the best physicians had failed 
in their attempts to restore the use of it, his grandfather, Dr. John Ruther- 
ford, had him sent to live in the country ( 3 ), ( 4 ). During a serious illness 
in later life, Scott “submitted without a murmur to the severe discipline 
prescribed by his affectionate physician [Dr. Daniel Rutherford]. . ." (5). 

John Rutherford was born in the Manse of Yarrow, Scotland, on August 
1 , 1695, was educated at the grammar school at Selkirk, and studied anat- 
omy, surgery, and materia medica in London and later in Leyden under 
Boerhaave. After receiving his medical degree from the University of 
Reims in 1719, he went to Edinburgh to engage in private practice. In 
November, 1724, he applied, with three other members of the College of 
Physicians, for the keeping of the college garden, which had fallen into 
disuse. With the consent of the town council, the four physicians raised 
medicinal plants there and, in order to prepare drugs for the apothecaries' 
shops, set up a chemical laboratory at their own expense. Two years later 
Dr. Rutherford was appointed Professor of the Practice of Medicine in the 
medical school which he had helped to found. He used Boerhaave's 
“ Aphorismi de Cognoscendis et Curandis Morbis " as a textbook, and for 
many years delivered clinical lectures in the Edinburgh Infirmary. He 
resigned in 1765, and died in 1779 at the age of eighty-four years (6), (7). 

According to Florence MacCunn, both Sir Walter Scott and his mother 
inherited their “homely features and look of gobd-tempered shrewdness" 
from “old Dr. Rutherford, whose homely, heavy, sensible face hangs in 
the rooms of the Edinburgh College of Physicians" (< 8 ). 

According to Lockhart, Dr. Daniel Rutherford “inherited much of the 
general accomplishments, as well as the professional reputation, of his 
father" (9). He was keenly interested in the classics, in English literature, 
and in mathematics, and his graduation thesis, like that of his celebrated 



108 


Discovery of the Elements 


professor, Dr. Joseph 
Black, dearly revealed 
the existence of a new 
gas. Just as Black's 
dissertation , “De hu - 
more acido a cibis orto } et 
magnesia alba"* pub- 
lished on June 11, 1754, 
had contained the dis- 
covery of carbon di- 
oxide, Rutherford’s the- 
sis, “ Dissertatio inaug- 
ur alis de aere fixo dicto, 
aut mephitico ,”t dated 
September 12, 1772, 

made clear the exist- 
ence of nitrogen (phlo- 
gisticated air) as distinct 
from carbon dioxide 
(fixed air). 

Although Stephen 
Hermann Boerhaave, 1668-1738 Hales had prepared ni- 

Dutch physician, anatomist, chemist, and botanist. frozen hv absorbing the 
The Edinburgh Medical School was founded by pupils tro 8 en aosorDing rne 
of Boerhaave while he was still in his prime. John oxygen from a confined 
Rutherford, father of Daniel Rutherford, was one of vo i ume Q f atmospheric 
ms ae voted disciples. r 

air, he had failed to 

recognize it as a new substance (10). Henry Cavendish was evidently the 
first person to distinguish nitrogen from other kinds of suffocating incom- 
bustible gases, but he had failed to publish his results. In a paper marked 
in his handwriting “communicated to Dr. Priestley," he had written: 

I am not certain what it is which Dr. P[riestley] means by mephitic 
air, though from some circumstances I guess that what he speaks of. . . 
was that to which Dr. Black has given* the name of fixed air. The 
natural meaning of mephitic air is any air which suffocates animals (& 
this is what Dr. Priestley seems to mean by the words), but in all prob- 
ability there are many kinds of air which possess this property. I 
am sure there are 2, namely, fixed air, & common air in which candles 
have burnt, or which has passed thro’ the fire. Air which has passed 
thro’ a charcoal ’fire contains a great deal of fixed air, which is generated 
from the charcoal, but it consists principally of common air, which has 
suffered a change in its nature from the fire. As I formerly made an 
experiment on this subject, which seems to contain some new circum- 
stances, I will here set it down. 

* The acid arising from food, and magnesia alba, 
f Inaugural dissertation on the air called fixed or mephitic. 




Cavendish’s Experiments on Nitrogen 


109 


I transferd some 
common air out of 
one receiver 
through burning 
charcoal into a 2nd 
receiver by means 
of a bent pipe, the 
middle of which 
was filled with 
powdered charcoal 
& heated red hot, 
both receivers be- 
ing inverted into 
vessels of water, & 
the 2nd receiver 
being full of water, 
so that no air could 
get into it but what 
came out of the 
first receiver & 
passed through the 
charcoal. The 
quant, air driven 
out of the first re- 
ceiver was 180 oz. 
measures, that 
driven into the 2nd 
receiver was 190 
oz. measures. In 
order to see whether 
any of this was 
fixed air, some sope 
leys was mixed with 
the water in the 
bason, into which 

the mouth of this 2nd receiver was immersed; it was thereby reduced 
to 166 oz.,* so that 24 oz. meas. were absorbed by the sope leys, all of 
which we may conclude to be fixed air produced from the charcoal; 
therefore 14 oz. of common air were absorbed by the fumes of the 
burning charcoal, agreeable to what Dr. Hales and others have ob- 
served, that all burning bodies absorb air. . .( 11 ) 



Sir Walter Scott, 1771-1832 
Scottish novelist and poet. His writings contain 
many interesting allusions to his uncle. Dr. Daniel 
Rutherford. Scott’s circle of friends included Dr. 
William Hyde Wollaston, Sir David Brewster, Dr. 
John Davy, Sir Humphry Davy, and Joseph Black. 


With characteristic thoroughness Cavendish had passed the 166 ounces 
of residual air back again through fresh burning charcoal into another 
receiver. After another treatment with the soap lye there remained 162 
ounces of a gas which he described as follows : 

The specific gravity of this air was found to differ very little from 
that of common air; of the two it seemed rather lighter. It extin- 
guished flame, & rendered common air unfit for making bodies bum, 
in the same manner as fixed air, but in a less degree. . .( 11 ) 

* The number 168 given in the British Association Reports is evidently a misprint. 


110 


Discovery of the Elements 


In a paper read before the Royal Society in March, 1772 (six months 
before Dr. Rutherford's thesis was published), Priestley mentioned these 
experiments, but failed to record Cavendish’s clear interpretation of them. 

The Honourable Mr. Cavendish favoured me [said he] with an ac- 
count of some experiments of his, in which a quantity of common air 
was reduced from 180 to 162 ounce measures, by passing through a 
red-hot iron tube filled with the dust of charcoal. This diminution he 
ascribed to such a destruction of common air as Dr, Hales imagined to 
be the consequence of burning. Mr. Cavendish also observed, that 
there had been a generation of fixed air in this process, but that it was 
absorbed by sope leys (72) . 

In the same paper Priestley stated : 

Air thus diminished by the fumes of burning charcoal not only ex- 
tinguishes flame, but is in the highest degree noxious to animals; it 
makes no effervescence with nitrous air, and is incapable of being di- 
minished any farther by the fumes of more charcoal, by a mixture of 
iron filings and brimstone, or by any other cause of the diminution of 
air that I am acquainted with. -This observation, which respects all 
other kinds of diminished air, proves that Dr. Hales was mistaken in 
his notion of the absorption of air in those circumstances in which he 
observed it. For he supposed that the remainder was, in all cases, of 
the same nature with that which had been absorbed, and that the 
operation of the same cause would not have failed to produce a farther 
diminution; whereas all my observations not only shew that air, which 
has once been fully diminished by any cause whatever, is not only in- 
capable of any farther diminution, either from the same or from any 
other cause, but that it has likewise acquired new properties, most re- 
markably different from those which it had before, and that they are, 
in a great measure, the same in all the cases. . . .(12) 

Priestley also observed that "‘lime-water never became turbid by the 
calcination of metals over it," and that "when this process was made in 
quicksilver, the air was diminished only one-fifth; and upon water being 
admitted to it, no more was absorbed" (22). He stated that this "air in 
which candles, or brimstone, had burned out. . . is rather lighter than com- 
mon air" (22). Thus Priestley recognized, even at this early date, some 
of the most important properties of the gas now known as nitrogen. 

Although the only copy of Rutherford's thesis which Sir William Ramsay 
was able to find is in the British Museum, Dr. Leonard Dobbin found a 
copy of it in the Edinburgh University Library and has published Crum 
Brown's English translation of it in the Journal of Chemical Education 
(40). Although Ramsay stated in the first edition of 4 "The Gases of the 
Atmosphere" that this dissertation "precedes Priestley's and Scheele’s 
writings by a year or two," he corrected this in the second edition to read : 
" . . . Priestley had nearly anticipated Rutherford; and indeed, he specu- 
lated on the nature of the residual gas, left after combustion and absorp* 



Rutherford's Experiments on Nitrogen 


111 


tion of the fixed air 
produced" (13). Al- 
though Rutherford re- 
ferred in his thesis to 
Priestley's experiments 
on the effect of vege- 
tation on the atmos- 
phere, he was evidently 
unfamiliar with those 
on nitrogen (14), (15). 

Dr. Black had noticed 
that when a carbona- 
ceous substance is 
burned in air in such a 
manner that the fixed 
air can be absorbed in 
caustic alkali, a portion 
of the air remains. He 
had therefore assigned 
to his student, Daniel 
Rutherford, the investi- 
gation of this residual 
air in partial fulfillment 
of the requirements for 
the degree of doctor of 
medicine. 

The dissertation be- 



British clergyman, biologist, chemist, and inventor. 
His most important researches were on blood pressure, 
circulation of sap, respiration, and ventilation. 


gins with an appropriate quotation from Lucretius and a review of the 
researches of Black and of Cavendish on fixed air. Rutherford then 


described his own experiments in which he had found that a mouse, 
left in a confined volume of atmospheric air until it died, had con- 
sumed Vie of the air, and that treatment of the remaining air with alkali had 
caused it to lose one-eleventh of its volume. He found that the residual 


air extinguished the flame of a candle and that the wick would continue 
to glow in it for only a short time. He also discovered that air depleted 
by passage over ignited charcoal is identical with air vitiated by respiration. 
When he burned a metal, ^phosphorus, or sulfur in the atmosphere, however, 
he found that the residual gas contained no mephitic air [carbon dioxide], 
but that it had undergone "a singular change" (14). After burning a 
candle or suffocating a mouse in a confined volume of air, and absorbing the 
resulting^Micei air, or carbon dioxide, in caustic alkali, Rutherford concluded 
from careful study of .the residual gas that 


112 


Discovery of the Elements 


. . .healthy and pure air by being respired, not only becomes partly 
mephitic [poisonous], but also suffers another change in its nature. 
For after all mephitic air [carbon dioxide] is separated and removed 
from it by means of a caustic lixivium, that which remains does not 
thence become more healthful; for although it makes no precipitate of 
lime from water, yet it extinguishes fire and life no less than before (16). 

Rutherford also believed that “pure air is not converted into mephitic air 
by force of combustion, but that this air rather takes its rise or is thrown 
out from the body thus resolved” (15). Heconcluded, in other words, “that 
that unwholesome air is composed of atmospheric air in union with, and, so 
to say, saturated with, phlogiston” (15). After pointing out the distinc- 
tion between this new “noxious air” [nitrogen] and “mephitic air” [carbon 
dioxide], the air evolved by the action of acids on metals, and the air from 
decaying flesh, Rutherford added that he was unable to state with cer- 
tainty anything regarding the composition of mephitic air nor to explain its 
inability to support life. He believed, however, that it was possibly gener- 
ated from the food, and expelled as a waste product from the blood by 
means of the lungs (14). , 

Certain experiments [said he] appear to show. . .that it consists of 
atmospheric air in union with phlogistic material : for it is never pro- 
duced except from bodies which ^abound in inflammable parts; the 
phlogiston ever appears to be taken up by other bodies, and is hence of 
value in reducing the calces of metals. I say from phlogistic ma- 
terial, because as already mentioned, pure phlogiston, in combination 
with common air, can be seen to yield another kind of air. . .(15) 

Sir William Ramsay believed that Rutherford “may well be credited 
with the discovery of nitrogen” and that his thesis on mephitic air “was 
an advance, though not a great one, in the development of the theory of the 
true nature of air” (15). B. B. Woodward believed, however, that “all 
the facts and views recorded by Rutherford are to be found in Priestley's 
memoir published in the Philosophical Transactions for 1772 (p. 230 et 
passim ), and read six months before the publication of Rutherford's tract; 
but Priestley's exposition is less methodical and precise” (14). Both 
Rutherford and Priestley believed the new gas to be atmospheric air satu- 
rated with phlogiston, and neither of them regarded it as an element (14). 

In his “Lectures on the Elements of Chemistry,” Dr. Joseph Black made 
the following statement about the discovery of nitrogen : 

Scarcely inferior to vital air in importance is the faul air of Dr. 
Scheele, which I mentioned on the same occasion, as that noxious por- 
tion of atmospherical air which remains when the vital air has been 
absorbed by the hepar sulphuris [product of heating potassium car- 
bonate with sulfur] (17). I must here observe, that this portion of 
our atmosphere was first observed in 1772 by my colleague Dr. Ruther- 
ford* and published by him in his inaugural dissertation. He had then 



Nitrogen 


113 


discovered that we were mistaken in supposing that all noxious air 
was the fixed air which I had discovered. He says, that after this has 
been removed by caustic alkali or lime, a very large proportion of the 
air remains, which extinguishes life and flame in an instant. Soon 
after this Dr. Priestley met with this noxious air, which was produced 
in a variety of experiments, in which bodies were burned, or putrefied, 
or thickened in certain cases, or metals calcined, or minerals efflo- 
resced, &c.&c. In all these cases, he thought that he had reason to be- 
lieve that phlogiston had quitted the substances under consideration — 
had combined with the air, — and had thus vitiated it. Now saturated 
with phlogiston, the air could take no more, and therefore extinguished 
flame. He called all these processes phlogisticating processes , and the 
air thus tainted phlogisticated air (18). 

According to Dr. Black, it was Scheele who proved that the diminution 
of bulk which accompanied the vitiation of the air by these combustion 
processes 

. . .was owing to a real abstraction of all the vital air which the atmos- 
pheric air contained . For when any of these ‘ 'phlogisticating processes ' ' 
of Dr. Priestley were performed in vital air, it was totally absorbed (19). 
The remainder therefore, when the experiment was made in common 
air, was considered by him as a primitive air, unchanged in its proper- 
ties. He called it faul air , which may mean either rotten air, because 
it is produced in vast abundance by putrefying bodies, or simply foul 
air , i. e., tainted occasionally, when the phlogiston is more than will 
saturate the vital air. 

Dr. Black also mentioned Berthollet’s preparation of nitrogen by pouring 
nitric acid on fresh muscle fiber and Fourcroy's discovery of this gas in the 
swimming bladders of carp, bream, and other fish (20). He said that, al- 
though the discoverers of the element had called it by various names — 
phlogisticated , foul, or mephitic air , or choke-damp (Stickstoff) — the name 
nitrogen had been suggested by “Mr. Chaptal and other chemists of the 
first rank/’ after Cavendish had prepared niter by sparking the new gas 
with oxygen in presence of caustic potash (21). The French name azote 
was suggested by Lavoisier because of the inability of the gas to support 
life (18), (22), (23), (24). Although Lavoisier (25) had mentioned nitrogen 
in his list of elements, Sir Humphry Davy doubted its elementary nature 
as late as 1808-09 and attempted to decompose it (26). 

After his graduation, young Dr. Rutherford studied in Paris, Italy, and 
London for three years before returning to Edinburgh to practice medicine. 
During his stay in Paris, he declined an invitation to a party at which 
Prince Charles Edward was expected, saying that, out of respect for the 
honor of a fallen house, he wished to avoid the spectacle of seeing the prince 
intoxicated (I). 

Since Max Speter (27), (41) mentioned that John Mayow in his “Trac- 
tatus Quinque” anticipated Lavoisier (28) in the belief that all adds contain 



114 


Discovery of the Elements 



John Hope, 1725-1786 

Predecessor of Daniel Rutherford as professor of botany 
and materia medica at the University of Edinburgh. Dr. 
Hope had the plants in the Botanical Garden arranged 
according to the Linnaean system. In the above por- 
trait he is shown instructing one of the workmen. His 
son, Thomas Charles Hope (1766-1844), was Rutherford’s 
contemporary as professor of chemistry at Edinburgh. 


oxygen, it is interest- 
ing to know that Dr. 
Rutherford also 
made the same error. 
A note by John Robi- 
son in his edition 
of Black's “Lectures 
on the Elements oj 
Chemistry " reads as 
follows : 

I cannot omit 
mentioning in this 
place, that my 
colleague, Dr. 
Daniel Rutherford 
read, in the year 
1775, to the Philo- 
sophical Society of 
Edinburgh, a dis- 
sertation on nitre 
and nitrous acid, 
in which this doc- 
trine is more than 
hinted at or sur- 
mised. By a series 
of judiciously con- 
trived experi- 
ments, he obtained 
a great quantity of 
vital air from nitric 
acid; about one- 
third of that quan- 
tity from the sul- 
phuric acid, as 
contained in alum ; 
and a small quan- 
tity (and this very 
variable and un- 
certain) from the 


muriatic acid. The manner in which it came off from the compounds, 


in various circumstances, led him to think that the different quantities 
obtained did not arise from the different proportions in which it was 


contained in those acids, but merely in the different forces with which 


it was retained. He therefore concluded that vital air was contained 


in all acids, and thought it likely that it was a necessary ingredient 
of an acid; and seeing that it was the only ‘substance found, as yet, in 
them all, he thought it not unlikely that it was by {his that they were 
add , and he points out a course of experiments which seems adapted to 
the decision of this question. I was appointed to make a report on this 


Daniel Rutherford 


115 


dissertation; and I recollect stating as an objection to Dr. Rutherford’s 
opinion, ‘‘that it would lay him under the necessity of supposing that 
vitriolic acid was a compound of sulphur and vital air,” which I could 
not but think an absurdity. So near were we at that time to the 
knowledge of the nature of the acids (29). 

Mayow’s “ Tractates Quinque ” was published in 1674, Dr. Rutherford’s 
communication was read in 1775, and Lavoisier’s statement that oxygen is 
an essential constituent of all acids is contained in a paper read on Novem- 
ber 23, 1779. 



From Kay’s Portraits 


Cartoon Showing a Controversy in 1817 over the Founding of a Chair 
of Comparative Anatomy 

The candidate, Dr. Barclay, is shown astride the elephant's skeleton. His 
opponent. Dr. Thomas Charles Hope (center foreground), has his anchor firmly 
grounded in “the strontian.” This is an allusion to the research in which he dis- 
tinguished between baryta and strontia. The scene is laid at the entrance to the 
old College of Edinburgh. 

In 1786 Rutherford was appointed successor to John Hope, the professor 
of botany at the University of Edinburgh, and in the same year he was 
married to Harriet Mitchelson of Middleton ( 1 ). With pardonable 
famil y pride, Sir Walter Scott once said that Dr. Rutherford “ought to 
have had the chemistry class, as he was one of the best chemists in Europe; 
but superior interest assigned it to another, who, though a neat experimen- 
talist, is not to be compared to poor Daniel for originality of genius. . 
(30). Bower’s ", History of the University of Edinburgh ” states that the 
discovery of nitrogen “entitles Rutherford to rank very high among the 


116 


Discovery of the Elements 


chemical philosophers of modern times” and that “the reputation of his 
discovery being speedily spread through Europe, his character as a chemist 
of the first eminence was firmly established, and much was augured from a 
young man in his twenty-second year having distinguished himself so 
remarkably” (30). 

Sir R. Christison, one of Dr. Rutherford’s botany students, said, on the 
other hand, 

Tradition had it in my student years that he was disappointed at not 
being made assistant and successor to Black in 1795, when that office 
was given to Dr. Charles Hope; and he again, son of the botanical 
predecessor of Rutherford, was said to have preferred to step into his 
own father's University shoes rather than into those of Dr. Black. 
However that may have been, Hope highly distinguished himself in 
his Chemical Chair; while Rutherford, in that of Botany, which he 
filled for thirty-four years, always seemed to lecture with a grudge, 
and never contributed a single investigation to the progress of the 
science which he taught. . .His lectures, however, were extremely 
clear, and full of condensed information, his style was beautiful, and 
his pronunciation pure and scarcely Scotch (31). 

Because of hereditary gout, Dr. Rutherford was unable to take his botany 
students on field trips, and Sir R. Christison thought that that important 
duty ought to have been entrusted to the head gardener (31). 

I. B. Balfour also thought it strange that Dr. Rutherford should have been 
chosen to teach botany, and stated in the “Makers of British Botany” that 
“Rutherford was a chemist, and I have not discovered in any references to 
him expressions that he was at this period of his life interested in plants 
otherwise than as objects for his experiments in relation to the chemistry of 
the atmosphere” (32). Nevertheless, the botanical garden developed under 
Rutherford’s administration into one of the best in the world, and the 
plants of Scotland were carefully recorded by the head gardeners (32). 

Dr. Rutherford was a fellow of the Philosophical (later the Royal) So- 
ciety of Edinburgh, and contributed to its Transactions a description of a 
thermometer for reading maximum and minimum temperatures (33), (34). 
The portion of the instrument designed for reading minimum temperatures 
is a horizontal tube filled with alcohol in which is immersed a small glass rod 
with a knob at each end. As long as the temperature keeps falling, the 
concave surface tension film of the alcohol drags this little rod back with it, 
but when the temperature rises, the expanding alcohol moves past the rod, 
leaving it stationary. The portion of the thermometer used for reading 
maximum temperatures consists of a horizontal tube containing a thread of 
mercury which pushes a small bar of iron ahead of it as long as the tem- 
perature keeps rising (34). Dr. Rutherford also made experiments to im- 
prove the air pump (33). 



Death of Daniel Rutherford 


117 


He published an octavo volume called “ Characteres Generum Plantar um” 
and collaborated with James Hamilton and James Gregory in writing “A 
Guide for Gentlemen Studying Medicine at the University of Edinburgh ” 
(14). He was a member of the Linnaean Society and of the Aesculapian, 
Harveian, and Gymnastic Clubs (14). 

Dr. and Mrs. Rutherford had two sons and three daughters, but in 1805 
the elder son, John, a boy of seventeen, was lost in the shipwreck of an 
East Indiaman commanded by John Wordsworth, a brother of the famous 
poet. After his words of sympathy to Wordsworth, Scott wrote, 44 . . . 
The same dreadful catastrophe deprived me of a near relation, a delightful 
and promising youth, the hope and pride of his parents. He had just ob- 
tained a cadetship, and parted from us all in the ardor of youthful hope and 
expectation, leaving his father (a brother of my mother) almost heart- 
broken at his departure. . .” (35). Fourteen years later Scott said, when 
writing to his son at the time of Dr. Rutherford’s death, “Since you knew 
him, his health was broken and his spirits dejected, which may be traced 
to the loss of his eldest son. ...” (30). 

Scott’s correspondence with his aunt, Miss Christian Rutherford, shows 
that he found in his uncle’s family 44 . . . more than one kind and strenuous 
encourager of his early literary tastes.” Nevertheless, his youthful habit 
of reading at breakfast often brought forth good-natured protest from the 
doctor (9). 

In December, 1819, Scott suffered the tragic loss of three of his nearest 
relatives within scarcely more than a week (30), (36). On the twelfth, his 
mother, who had been in excellent health and spirits in spite of her ad- 
vanced age of eighty-seven years, was suddenly stricken with such a severe 
attack of paralysis that Dr. Daniel Rutherford felt certain that she could 
not live more than a few days. 

But [said Scott in a letter to his brother in Canada], 4 4 this heavy 
calamity was only the commencement of our family losses. Dr. 
[Daniel] Rutherford, who had seemed perfectly well and had visited 
my mother upon Tuesday the fourteenth, was suddenly affected with 
gout in his stomach, or some disease equally rapid, on Wednesday the 
fifteenth, and without a moment’s warning or complaint, fell down a 
dead man, almost without a single groan. You are aware of his fond- 
ness for animals; he was just stroking his cat after eating his breakfast, 
as usual, when, without more warning than a half-uttered exclamation, 
he sunk on the ground, and died in the arms of his daughter Anne. 
Though the Doctor had no formed complaint, yet I have thought him 
looking poorly for some months ; and though there was no failure what- 
ever in intellect, or anything which approached it, yet his memory 
was not so good, and I thought he paused during the last time he at- 
tended me, and had difficulty in recollecting the precise terms of his 
recipe. Certainly there was a great decay of outward strength. 

We were very anxious about the effect this fatal news was likely to 



118 


Discovery of the Elements 


produce on the mind and decayed health of our aunt, Miss C. Ruther- 
ford, and resolved, as her health had been gradually falling off ever 
since she returned from Abbotsford, that she should never learn any- 
thing of it until it was impossible to conceal it longer. But God had 
so ordained it that she was never to know the loss she had sustained, 
and which she would have felt so deeply. On Friday the 17th Decem- 
ber, the second day after her brother's death, she expired, without a 
groan and without suffering, about six in the morning. . .It is a most 
uncommon and afflicting circumstance, that a brother and two sisters 
should be taken ill the same day — that two of them should die without 
any rational possibility of the survivance of the third — and that no one 
of the three could be affected by learning the loss of the other. The 
Doctor was buried on Monday 20th, and Miss Rutherford this day 
(Wednesday 22nd), in the burial-place adjoining to and surrounding 
one of the new Episcopal chapels [St. John’s Chapel], where Robert 
Rutherford [son to the professor of botany] had purchased burial- 
ground of some extent. . .and in this new place I intend to lay our poor 
mother when the scene shall close. . . (37) . 

Scott once paid the following tribute to his uncle: 4 ‘Dr. Rutherford was 
a very ingenious as well as an excellent man, more of a gentleman than those 
of his profession too often are, for he could not take the back-stairs mode of 



Rutherford’s Maximum and Minimum Thermometer 
a . . . Index of minimum thermometer. 
m . . .Index of maximum thermometer. 


rising in it, otherwise he might have been much more wealthy. . (30). 

This kindly Scottish physician is remembered today for his maximum and 
minimum thermometer and for the brilliant research in which he clearly 
distinguished between carbon dioxide and nitrogen (38), (39). 

Literature Cited 

(1) Rogers, C., “Genealogical Memoirs of the Family of Sir Walter Scott, Bart, of 
Abbotsford,” Roy. Historical Soc„ London, 1877, pp. lv-lviii. 

(2) Lockhart, J. G., “Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott,” Adam & Charles 
Black, Edinburgh, 1862 , Vol. 1, p. 14. 

(3) Lockhart, J. G., ref. ( 2 ), Vol. 1, pp. 19-21. 

(4) “Catalogue of the Scott Centenary Exhibition,” Edinburgh University Press, 
Edinburgh, 1872 , p. 149. 

(5) Lockhart, J. G., ref. ( 2) t Vol. 1, p. 173. 

(6) Rogers, C., ref. (1), p. lii. 

(7) Grant, Sir Alexander, “The Story of the University of Edinburgh during Its 
First Three Hundred Years,” Longmans, Green & Co., London, 1884 , Vol. 1, pp. 
308^15. 




Literature Cited 119 

(8) MacCunn, P., “Sir Walter Scott’s Friends,” Wm. Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh 
and London, 1910, p. 12. 

(9) Lockhart, J. G., ref. (2), Vol. 1, p. 188. 

(10) Clark-Kennedy, A. E., ‘‘Stephen Hales, D. D., F.R.S.,” University Press, 
Cambridge, 1929, pp. 101-10. 

(11) Harcourt, V., “Presidential address,” Brit. Assoc . Reports , 9, 3-68 (Aug., 1839) 
A reprint of Cavendish's paper on nitrogen is included. 

(12) Priestley, J., “Observations on different kinds of air,” Phil. Trans., 62, 147-256 
(1772). Read Mar. 5, 12, 19, 26 (1772). 

( 13 ) Ramsay, Sir W., “The Gases of the Atmosphere,” 1st ed., Macmillan & Co,, 
London, 1896, p. 62; ibid., 2nd ed., 1915, p. 63. 

(14) Lee, Sir Sidney, “Dictionary of National Biography,” The Macmillan Co., 
New York City, 1897, Vol. 50, pp. 5-6. Article on Daniel Rutherford by B. B. 
Woodward. 

(15) Ramsay, Sir W., ref. (13), 2nd ed., pp. 62-8. 

(16) Grant, Sir Alexander, ref. (7), Vol. 2, pp. 382-4. 

(17) Sciieele, C. W., “Nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnungen,” Nordenskibld 
edition, P. A. Norstedt & Sbner, Stockholm, 1892, p. 80. Letter of Scheele to 
J. G. Gahn, Nov., 1775. 

(18) Black, Joseph, “Lectures on the Elements of Chemistry,” Wm. Creech, Edin- 
burgh, 1803, Vol. 2, pp. 105-8. 

(19) Dobbin, L., “The Collected Papers of Carl Wilhelm Scheele,” G. Bell & Sons, 
London, 1931, pp. 116-7. 

(20) Fourcroy, A.-F., “Recherches pour servir & l’histoire du gaz azote ou de la 
rnofette, comme principe des matidres animales,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 1, 40-7 
(1795); “Observations sur le gaz azote contenu dans la vessie natatoire de la 
carpe; deux nouveaux procddds pour obtenir ce gaz,” ibid., [1 ], 1, 47-51 (1795). 

(21) Alembic Club Reprint No. 3, "Experiments on air. Papers published in the 
Philosophical Transactions by the Honourable Henry Cavendish, F.R.S.,” Wm. F. 
Clay, Edinburgh, 1893, pp. 39-52; H. Cavendish, Phil. Trans., 75, 372-84 
(1785). Read June 2, 1785. 

(22) Black, Joseph, ref. (18), Vol. 1, pp. 395-6. 

(23) Black, Joseph, ref. (18), Vol. 1, p. lv. 

(24) “Oeuvres de Lavoisier,” Imprimerie Impdriale, Paris, 1864, Vol. 1, p. 63; “Nitro- 
gen and phosphorus. Classic of science,” Sci. News Letter, 22, 102-4 (Aug. 13, 
1932). 

(25) “Oeuvres de Lavoisier,” ref. (24), Vol. 1, pp. 135-7. 

(26) Davy, H., “The Bakerian lecture. An account of some new analytical researches 
on the nature of certain bodies,” Phil. Trans., 99, 55-6, 103-4 (1809). Read 
Dec. 15, 1808. 

(27) Speter, Max, “John Mayow und das Schicksal seiner Lehren,” Chem.-Ztg., 34, 
946-7, 953-4, 962-4 (Sept. 1910); Alembic Club Reprint No. 17, University of 
Chicago Press, Chicago, III., 1908, pp. 31-2. Translation of Mayow's “Tractatus 
Quinque Medico-Physici.” 

(28) “Oeuvres de Lavoisier,” ref. (24), Vol. 1, p. 57; ibid., Vol. 2, pp. 248-60. Paper read 
Nov. 23, 1779. Presented Sept. 5, 1777. 

(29) Black, J., ref. (18), Vol. 2, p. 213 (note 6) and p. 732. 

(30) Lockhart, J. G., ref. (3), Vol. 6, pp. 157-9. (Letter of Sir W. S. to his son. 
Cornet Walter Scott); Bower, “History of the University of Edinburgh,” 1830, 
Vol. 3, pp. 260-1. Quoted by Lock har t. 

(31) Grant, Sir Alexander, ref. (7), Vol. 2, pp. 382-4. 



120 Discovery of the Elements 

(32) Oliver, F. W., “Makers of British Botany,” Cambridge University Press, Cam- 
bridge, 1913, pp. 290-1. Chapter by I. B. Balfour on “A sketch of the professors 
of botany in Edinburgh from 1670 until 1887.” 

(33) Poggbndorff, J. C., “Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch der exakten 
Wissenschaften,” Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863-1937, Vol. 2, p. 726. 
Article on Daniel Rutherford. 

(34) Edser, E., “Heat for Advanced Students,” Macmillan & Co., London, 1911, pp. 
18-9; R. T. Glazebrook, “Heat,” Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 
1914, p. 25; T. Preston, “Theory of Heat,” 2nd ed., Macmillan & Co., London, 
1904, p. 113. 

(35) Douglas, David, “Familiar Letters of Sir Walter Scott,” Houghton Mifflin Co., 
Boston, 1894, Vol. 1, p. 27. 

(36) Lockhart, J. G., ref. (2), Vol. 6, pp. 160-1; D. Douglas, ref. (35), Vol. 2, pp. 66 
and 69-70. (Letters of Sir Walter Scott to Wm. Laidlaw, to J. B. Morritt, and 
to Joanna Baillie.) 

(37) Lockhart, J. G., ref. (2), Vol. 6, pp. 164-8. (Letter of Sir Walter to his brother, 
Thomas Scott.) 

(38) Weeks, M. E., “The discovery of the elements. IV. Three important gases,” 
J. Chem. Educ., 9, 219-21 (Feb., 1932). 

(39) “Dan. Rutherford iiber die mephitische Luft,” CrelTs Neueste Entdeckungen in 
der Chemie, Weygandsche Buchhandlung, Leipzig, 1784, Vol. 12, pp. 187-96. 

(40) Dobbin, L., “Daniel Rutherford’s inaugural dissertation. Crum Brown’s 
translation,” J. Chem. Educ., 12, 370-5 (Aug., 1935). 

(41) Speter, Max, “Lavoisier und seine Vorlaufer,” F. Enke, Stuttgart, 1910, pp. 
56-72, 96-108. Chapter on John Mayow. 




VII. CHROMIUM, MOLYBDENUM, TUNGSTEN, AND URANIUM 

The publications and correspondence of Bergman and Scheele contain 
interesting allusions to the d’Elhuyar brothers , to Hjelm , and to the early 
history of the metals tungsten and molybdenum which they discovered . The 
presence of a new metal in pitchblende was recognized by Klaproth in 1789, 
but it remained for Peligot half a century later to isolate uranium . Chromium, 
now the most familiar element of the group , was the last to be discovered when 
the immortal French chemist Vauquelin finally isolated it in 1798 from a 
Siberian mineral . For further information about tungsten see pp. 143-56. 


“ Les laboratoires sont les temples de Vavenir, de la richesse et 
du bien-etre; c'est Id que V humanity grandit , se fortifie et dement 
meilleure.” ( 1 )* 

During the last two decades of the eighteenth century, investigations 
were made which foreshadowed the discovery of chromium, molybdenum, 
tungsten, uranium, tel- 
lurium, chlorine, tita- 
nium, and beryllium; 
but some of these ele- 
ments were not actually 
isolated until much 
later. For the sake of 
simplicity, only the 
closely related ele- 
ments, tungsten, mo- 
lybdenum, uranium, 
and chromium will be 
considered in this chap- 
ter. 

Tungsten 

T ungsten and tungstic 
acid were first recog- Lampadius* Laboratory at Frbibrrg, 1800 

nized in the minerals Many of the most eminent mineralogical chemists in 

lr , , i Europe were educated at the Freiberg School of Mines, 

wolframite and scheel- The d’Elhuyar brothers, who discovered tungsten, and A. 
ite As earlv as 1761 M. del Rio, who discovered vanadium (“erythronium”), 

* « y * received part of their training there, and F. Reich and 

J . G. Lehmann ana- h. T. Richter, the discoverers of indium, and Clemens 
lvzed the former with- Winkler, the discoverer of germanium, were members of 
J ’ the teaching staff. 

out recognizing, how- 
ever, that it contained two metals which were then unknown, tungsten and 
manganese. When he fused it with sodium nitrate and dissolved the melt 

* * 'Laboratories are the temples of the future, of wealth, and of welfare; in them 
humanity grows greater, stronger, and better.” 

121 





122 


Discovery of the Elements 


in water, he obtained a green solution which became red (sodium manga- 
nate and permanganate). Addition of a mineral acid caused the precipita- 
tion of a soft, spongy, white earth (tungstic acid) which, after long standing 
in contact with the solution, became yellow. He concluded, however, that 
the wolframite from Zinnwald must be “a mineral consisting mainly of a 
glassy earth, much iron, and a trace of zinc” and that it is related to a min- 
eral used by glassmakers, “ magnesia vitriariorum ,” or pyrolusite (58). 

In 1779 Peter Woulfe examined this mineral and concluded that it must 
contain something new. ‘ ‘The Spar of the Germans, ’ ’ said he, “is commonly 
called white tin ore .... This is supposed by several to be rich in tin ; but 
the Saxon mineralogists assert that it contains none. The only experiment 
I made with it was to digest it in a powdered state with acids, by which 
means it acquires a rich yellow colour, like turbith mineral [basic mercuric 
sulfate] ; the acid of salt answers best for this experiment. This is the only 
substance I know of which has this property” (65). 

There is found in Sweden a white mineral which used to be called tung- 
sten , or heavy stone , and which is now kriown as scheelite (20). In 1781 
Scheele gave the following description of it: “The constituents of this 
variety of stone seem probably to be still unknown to chemists. Cron- 
stedt enumerates it amongst the ferruginous varieties of stone, under the 
name of Ferrum calciforme, terra quadam incognita intime mixtum. That 
which I used for my experiments is pearl-coloured and taken from the iron 
mine of Bitsberg” (56). He decomposed the mineral with aqua fortis 
(nitric acid) and found that it contained lime and a white acidic powder 
similar to molybdic acid but differing from it in the following respects : 

“(1) The acid of molybdaena is volatile and melts in the fire, which does 
not occur with acid of tungsten. (2) The first-named acid has a stronger 
affinity for phlogiston, which is seen from its union with sulphur and the 
change it undergoes on calcination with oil. (3) Calx molybdaenata does 
not become yellow with acid of nitre and is dissolved by it quite easily. 
With tungsten the contrary occurs. (4) Terra ponder osa molybdaenata is 
soluble in water, but not the same variety of earth united with our acid ; and 
(5) acid of molybdaena has a weaker attraction for lime than our acid” (56). 

Thinking, because of its high specific gravity, that scheelite might con- 
tain the alkaline earth baryta, Torbem Bergman analyzed it, but found in- 
stead an acidic oxide (tungstic acid). In 1781 he concluded that both tung- 
stic and molybdic acids must be related to white arsenic and that therefore 
it ought to be possible to prepare metals from them. Since Bergman him- 
self could not find time to test this hypothesis, he expressed the hope 
that someone else would make the necessary experiments (57). 

In the meantime two Spanish chemists, the d’Elhuyar* brothers, found 

* The name was also spelled Luyarte, de Luyart, and d'Elhuyart. In Spanish books 
it is spelled de Elhuyar. The brothers themselves did not agree as to the spelling. 



Tungsten 


123 


in wolfram, a dark brown mineral (wolframite) then supposed to be an 
ore of tin and iron, an acid (wolframic) which they found to be identical with 
tungstic acid (2), (21), (25), (37), (38). 

Don Fausto d'Elhuyar was 
born in 1755 at Logrofio, Spain. 

With his brother, Don Juan 
Jos6, he went to Freiberg to 
study chemistry and mineralogy 
at the School of Mines, and 
Don Juan Jos4 later went to Up- 
sala to work for half a year in 
Bergman's famous laboratory 
(21), (41). The Swedish pro- 
fessor mentioned him in his 
diary. “Mr. de Luyarte, from 
Spain,” said he, “came with 
Mr. de Virly to Upsala on 
the same errand [to study], 
where they not only privately 
went through an entire course 
in higher chemistry, but also, 
with others, went to private 
lectures in assaying, each pass- 
ing excellent tests. They re- 
mained until the end of the 
term” (27), (39). 

In a letter to Bergman dated 
July 5, 1782, Scheele mentioned 
a visit which these chemistry 
students had recently paid him : 

“. . . The foreign gentlemen,” 
he said, “stayed with me two 
days; I found real pleasure in 
talking with them about chemi- 
cal matters; moreover they were 
not inexperienced in that field” 

(3). 

In 1783 the brothers collabo- 
rated in a research on tungsten 
and wolfram, and found that both these ores contained the tungstic add 
that Scheele had reported. The first metallic tungsten was prepared not 
from scheelite but from wolframite ( spuma lupi ) from Zinnwald. “We 
know no Spanish name for this mineral,” wrote the d’ Elhuyar brothers in 



From Nordenskidld’s “Carl Wilhelm Schede. 
Nachgclasstnc Brief e und Aufzeichnungen ” 

B6rjeson’s Statue of Carl Wilhelm 
Scheele 

Scheele discovered * tungstic and molybdic 
acids, and was the first to distinguish between 
graphite and molybdenite. 


124 


Discovery of the Elements 


1783, “nor do we know that it has been found in our country” (58). The 
possibility of obtaining a new metal by reducing tungstic acid had already 
been suggested by Bergman and Scheele. The apparatus used by the 
d’ Elhuyar brothers was very simple. An intimate mixture of tungstic acid 
and powdered charcoal was heated strongly in a luted crucible (22). After 
cooling the crucible, they removed from it a dark brown, metallic button, 
which crumbled easily in their fingers, and when they examined the powder 
with a lens, they saw metallic globules of tungsten, some of which were as 
large as the head of a pin (2), (26). On April 2, 1784, Scheele wrote to 
Bergman, “I am glad that Mr. Luyarte has obtained a tungsten regulus. 
I hope he has sent you specimens of it” (4). 

The d’ Elhuyar brothers afterward 



went to America and in 1788 Fausto 
became Director of Mines of Mexico. 
Don Juan Jos6 died in Bogota, Colom- 
bia, but at the outbreak of the Revo- 
lution Don Fausto returned to Spain. 
His reason for leaving Mexico may be 
"inferred from the note found at the end 
of one of Andres del Rio's papers: 

* The preceding analysis only too 
plainly shows the wretched state 
of our laboratory in Mexico, after 
having been for thirty years under 
the direction of so distinguished a 
chemist as M. Elhuyar, the dis- 
coverer of wolfram and cerium [ ! ] 

It is true that under the old govern- 
ment, this savant found himself 
obliged to become a man of busi- 
ness, undoubtedly much against 
his inclination ; for it is impossible 
that he who has once imbibed a 
taste for science can ever abandon it (5). 

After returning to Spain Fausto served on the General Council of Public 
Credit, was made Director General of Mines, drew up the famous mining 
law of 1825, and planned the School of Mines of Madrid. After a long, 
eventful, and useful life, he died in Madrid on January 6, 1833 ( 6 ). 

In 1785 Rudolf Erich Raspe, author of “The Adventures of Baron 
MUnchausen,' ’ showed that the metal obtained from scheelite is identical 


Courtesy Dr. Moles and Mr. de Gdlvez- 
Caftero 

Fausto de Elhuyar 

President of the Mining Tribunal 
and Director General of Mines of 
New Spain. For more than thirty 
years he directed the College of Mines 
of Mexico. 


with that from wolframite and that it hardens steel (59). In an investiga- 
tion of two refractory specimens of scheelite, he succeeded in reducing 
them to a “regulus which contains only a little iron and is unusually hard, 
strong, and refractory. It cuts glass like good hardened steel and is there- 
fore well suited for the manufacture of all kinds of hard tools, for the im- 



Tungsten 


125 


provement of several iron- and steel manufactures, even perhaps for the 
pouring of anchors in a single operation.’ ’ He also prepared a fine yellow 
pigment from the mineral. 

When he compared a regulus from wolframite with one from scheelite, 
he found that the former contained more iron and that “it has almost the 
same color as the scheelite regulus and is, if I be not mistaken, one and the 
same thing. Only yesterday I began the experiments with wolframite, 
which I regard as a kind of crystallized scheelite and which, according to a 
report in the newspapers, Don Luyarte [de Elhuyar] and another Spaniard 
have recently announced as containing a new metal’ * (59). J. Hawkins 
said that Raspe obtained his wolframite from “Poldice” [Poldise], Corn- 
wall and his scheelite from Entral (60). Wolframite is now known to be a 
ferrous manganous tungstate of the composition (Fe, Mn)W0 4 ; scheelite 
is calcium tungstate, CaW0 4 . 

Rudolf Erich Raspe was bom in 1737 in Hanover and educated in the 
natural sciences and philology at Gottingen and Leipzig. Benjamin 
Franklin met both Raspe and Baron von Munchausen on his visit in Han- 
over (61). Raspe was brilliant and versatile, but extravagant and dis- 
honest. After he had pawned some valuable medals which he had stolen 
from the museum at Cassel, the police described him as a red-haired man, 
attired alternately in a gold -embroidered red suit, and suits of black, blue, 
and gray. After his arrest at Clausthal, he escaped in the night and em- 
barked for England, where for the rest of his life he earned his living by 
tutoring and translating. He was also employed for a time in the mines of 
Cornwall and Ireland. He died at Mucross, Ireland, in 1794 (62). 

As late as 1800, F. C. Gren wrote: “It is still questionable whether the 
oxyd of wolfram is reducible to a reguline metal. No chemist has yet suc- 
ceeded in obtaining a pure regulus of it, at least of some magnitude. 
Whenever the experiment was attempted, the result, upon examination with 
the glass, was always found to be a mere congeries of small metallic glob- 
ules” (63). 

Nicholson's Journal for the same year contained a brief account of Guy- 
ton-Morveau’s attempt to fuse tungsten: “Guyton, in a fire urged by the 
blast of three pipes to 185 degrees of the pyrometer, obtained a well 
rounded piece of 35 grammes. But it broke in the vice, and exhibited a 
central portion, which was only agglutinated, and soon acquired a purple 
colour by exposure to the air . . . and he concludes from the infusibility and 
brittleness of this metal that it affords little promise of utility in the arts, 
except in metallic alloys, or by virtue of the property which its oxide pos- 
sesses, of affording fixed colours, or giving fixity to the colours of vegeta- 
bles” (64). The tungsten lamp filaments, tungsten contact points, and 
high-speed steel so indispensable to modem life have all resulted neverthe- 



126 Discovery of the Elements 

less from the great discovery made so long ago by the d’ Elhuyar brothers 
in Spain. 

Molybdenum 

Native molybdenum disulfide is a soft, black mineral that looks much like 
graphite. In fact, until the latter part of the eighteenth century, both 
were sold under the same name: Molybdan, or molybdenum . German 
writers used to call molybdenite “Wasserbley,” a name suggestive of lead. 
Although Johann Heinrich Pott knew that it is not a lead mineral, he con- 



Courtesy Fansteel Products Co., Inc. 

Vacuum Tube Showing the Use of Tantalum and Molybdenum 


fused it with graphite, “Reissbley,” and believed that it consisted of lime, 
iron, and sulfuric acid (50). 

In 1754 Rengt (Andersson) Qvist, a friend of A. F. Cronstedt and Sven 
Rinman, investigated a mineral which he described as follows: “At one 
locality of the Bispberg there is found a light, roughly pointed, loose, glis- 
tening molybdenite (Wasserblei) consisting of flexible lamellae which are 
not firmly coherent and which for the most part succeed one another in 
the form of regular pyramids .... In the muffle it gave off dense black 
fumes and a suffocating sulfurous odor; at the same time appeared small 
yellow “flowers” like snowflakes, which crystallized in masses of rather 
elastic filaments or lamellae” (52). 

Qvist observed that the calx was yellow while hot but glistening white 



Molybdenum 


127 


when cold. He obtained positive tests for iron and copper, and found that 
“on digestion, it gave no sweetness to distilled vinegar” (an indication that 
molybdenite is not a lead mineral). In one specimen from England he de- 
tected tin. He concluded that “it is evident from several experiments that 
the molybdenite itself contains something specifically metallic in addition 
to those just mentioned” {51). 

On December 19, 1777, Scheele wrote to J. G. Gahn: “You doubtless 
have there in your mineral collection some foliated molybdaena like the en- 
closed sample. I received some in the summer from Assessor Hoffgaard; 
I find something peculiar in it. Please be so good as to send me a little of 
it by mail. On some better occasion I shall describe my experiments” {52) . 

Scheele kept this promise, and on May 15th of the following year wrote 
Gahn as follows: “I now have the pleasure of giving you a short report of 
my experiments with molybdaena . Professor Bergman, Assessor Rinman, 
and B. Hermelin [Samuel Gustav Hermelin] all sent me some of it” {52). 

In 1778 Scheele published his analysis of the so-called “lead ore” (molyb- 
denite), then known as molybdaena. “I do not mean the ordinary lead ore,” 
said he, “that is met with in the apothecaries’ shops, for this is very different 
from that concerning which I now wish to communicate my experiments to 
the Royal Academy. I mean here that which in Cronstedt’s Mineralogy is 
called molybdaena membranacea nitens and with which Qvist and others 
probably made their experiments. The kinds I had occasion to submit to 
tests were got in different places, but they were all found to be of the same 
nature and composed of the same constituents” {53). 

Because of its softness, Scheele had to devise an ingenious method of pul- 
verizing the mineral. “Now since it does not permit of being ground to fine 
powder by itself, on account of its flexible lamellae, some fragments of 
vitriolated tartar [potassium sulfate] were also placed in the glass mortar 
occasionally, when it was at last transformed to a fine powder” {53). 
Scheele then washed the powder by decantation with hot water to remove 
the potassium sulfate. By adding nitric acid to the mineral several times 
and evaporating to dryness, he succeeded in decomposing it so completely 
that only a white powder remained, which he named terra molybdaenae . 

Bengt Qvist had already shown that the mineral is volatile in the open 
fire and that it contains sulfur, and Scheele found that “earth of molyb- 
daena is of an acid nature.” He examined it “by the method of reduction 
with black flux and charcoal and with glass of borax and charcoal, but it was 
in vain; I did not perceive anything in the least metallic” {53). Scheele 
showed that graphite and the molybdenum mineral are two entirely dif- 
ferent substances. Although nitric acid has no effect on graphite, it reacts 
with the mineral “molybdenum,” or molybdenite, to give sulfuric acid 
and a peculiar white solid, which he named molybdic acid {2), {23). Berg- 
man suggested to Scheele that molybdic acid must be the oxide of a new 



128 


Discovery of the Elements 


metal, and since the latter chemist did not have a furnace suitable for the 
purpose, he asked his friend Hjelm to attempt the reduction of the ore (7). 

Peter Jacob Hjelm was of about the same age as Scheele, for he was born 
on October 2, 1746, at Sunnerbo Harad. He probably met the latter in 
Upsala, for their correspondence began shortly before Scheele went to 
Koping (7). At Scheele’ s suggestion he tried to reduce molybdic acid with 
carbon, and in order to get very intimate contact between the two reagents, 
he stirred the pulverized acid with linseed oil to form a paste. When he 
heated the mixture strongly in a closed crucible, the oil became carbonized, 
and the carbon reduced the molybdic acid to the metal, which became 
known as molybdenum (2), {24). 

On November 16, 1781, Scheele wrote to Hjelm, 

... I gladly excuse your delay in writing, for I know you are 
now very busy. 1 rejoice that we now have another new half-metal, 
molybdaenum. I think I can already see the French seeking to deny 
the existence of this new half-metal, since they are not the discoverers 
of it . . . The acidum enclosed in paper is the same acid that I fused in a 
crucible. If you prepare a regulus from it, I beg you, because of its 
rarity, to send me some of it, even if it is only a grain. I have no 
molybdaenum (8). 

In another of his letters to Hjelm he said, “As far as I can judge of your 
work, it does you all credit' * (9). 

Although this correspondence shows that Hjelm must have isolated 
molybdenum as early as the fall of 1781, his first paper on it was not pub- 
lished until much later. In 1790, after both Scheele and Bergman had 
died, he wrote : 

“At the request of the late Scheele and Bergman, I tried to prepare a 
metal from yellow molybdic acid, using the same acid which the former him- 
self sent me. I first fused ox blood several times with the vegetable alkali : 
then, when I wanted to reduce the acid, I added to it an equal amount of 
microcosmic salt, and a little tartar or black flux from which I had often 
smoked off some grease. I placed the entire mixture, sometimes also cov- 
ered with common salt, in a luted crucible, and exposed it for several hours 
to the heat of a good wind furnace. If one wishes to reduce a new portion 
of acid again, one uses the glass produced in the foregoing operation, as it 
might then be less inclined to attack the earth of molybdenum itself and to 
dissolve it. 

“The small regulus I obtained from the meager supply of earth brought 
forth the description of it to be found in Herr Bergman’s paper on the blow- 
pipe. The traces of sulfur and iron present in the reguluses I attribute to 
the molybdic earth which I received, for my fluxes were perfectly pure; 
the former were therefore only a kind of crude metal in which, however, 
the metallic nature is fundamental. Several writers, including Herr [Ber- 



Molybdenum 129 

trand] Pelletier, Sage, Ilsemann, and Heyer, assume this: yet they have 
not engaged in the actual reduction’ * (42). 

Hjelm prepared purified molybdic acid and a pure regulus, which he ex- 
amined with the microscope. In an unsuccessful attempt to fuse the molyb- 
denum, he raised the temperature of the wind-furnace with “fire-air” 
(oxygen) obtained by adding two pounds of crude pyrolusite to the fire (24). 

He published papers on the composition of coal, wood, charcoal, steel, 
pyrolusite, molybdenite, and spring waters, on the arts of purifying lead, 
hardening copper, and burning bricks, on the working of saltpeter and in- 
digo, on resuscitation of patients with suspended animation, and on the 
porphyry industry at Elfdal, East Dalarne (54). 



Torbbrn Olof Bergman, 1735 - 17&4 

Swedish chemist, pharmacist, and physicist. He was among the first to investigate 
the compounds of manganese, cobalt, nickel, tungsten, and molybdenum. 


In 1782 Hjelm was made Assay Master of the Royal Mint at Stockholm, 
and twelve years later he became Director of the Chemistry Laboratory at 
the Bureau erf Mines. He died in that city on October 7, 1813 (7). 

Edward Daniel Clarke, who visited him in 1799, described him as “a 
most intelligent man and very able chemist, of the name of Hjelm, who 
permitted us to see the collection of minerals belonging to the Crown .... 
Mr. Hjelm was employed, at the time of our arrival, in making what he 
called Spa Water; that is to say, water impregnated with carbonic acid 
gas; by the usual process of agitating the fluid in a receiver containing the 
gas collected from the effervescence of limestone when exposed to the action 
of an acid. Mr. Hjelm used the sulphuric acid and powdered marble. He 
showed to us a very great chemical curiosity; namely, a mass of chromium 
in the metallic state, nearly as large as the top of a man's thumb. We could 






130 


Discovery of the Elements 


perceive, however, that the Swedish chemists, celebrated as they justly are, 
carry on their works in the large way: the furnaces used by Mr. Hjelm, 
in the Royal Laboratory, were of the size of those in our common black- 
smiths' shops; and the rest of his apparatus was on a similar scale" (55). 

Professor Hjelm was one of Scheele’s best friends, and their correspon- 
dence is still treasured by the Stockholm Academy of Sciences. In his later 
days Hjelm kept a complete diary, which is now in possession of the Royal 
Library at Stockholm (7) . When Scheele wrote to Hjelm, ‘ l E$ istja nur die 
Wahrheit, welche wir wissen wollen , und welch ein herrliches Gefiihl ist es nicht , 
sie erforscht zu haben”* (10), he knew that he was expressing the latter's 
feelings as well as his own. 

In 1785 B. Pelletier proved that the ore mineralogists used to call “molyb- 
denum" is a sulfide of that metal (28). The molybdic acid obtained by 
Scheele does not exist as such in the mineral, but was produced when he 
oxidized the molybdenum sulfide with nitric acid. 

Molybdenum is a much softer, more ductile metal than tungsten, and is 
indispensable for the filaments, grids, and screens required in radio broad- 
casting. Hence this great modern industry rests upon the researches that 
gave so much intellectual pleasure to Hjelm and Scheele. 

Uranium 

The early history of uranium is closely associated with the name of 
Martin Heinrich Klaproth, a German chemist who was born in Werni- 
gerode in the Harz on December 1, 1743. When he was eight years old, 
the family became impoverished by a serious fire. Since there was little 
money left for the education of the three Klaproth boys, little Martin 
Heinrich earned his tuition by singing in the church choir. After receiving 
a little instruction in Latin at Wemigerode, he was apprenticed at the age 
of sixteen years to an apothecary. After five years of apprenticeship, he 
worked for four years in public laboratories at Quedlinburg and at Han- 
over, and at Easter time in 1768 he became an assistant in Wendland's 
laboratory in Berlin "at the sign of the Golden Angel in the street of the 
Moors" (11), (40). 

In 1770 he became an assistant to the famous chemist, Valentin Rose, 
who, however, died only a few months later. Although Klaproth was 
only twenty-seven years old when this emergency arose, he met all the 
responsibilities of his new position. He not only carried on Rose's duties 
for nine years, but acted as a father to his two fatherless sons, providing 
carefully for their education. The younger boy unfortunately died in child- 
hood, but the older one, Valentin Rose the Younger, shared Klaproth's 
love for nature, and collaborated with him in many researches. It was 

* "It is only the truth that we want to know, and isn't it a glorious feeling to have dis- 
covered it?" , 



Uranium 


131 


Rose’s task to repeat and verify all Klaproth’s experiments before the 
results were published (11). Klaproth afterward purchased the Flem- 
ming laboratory on Spandau Street. His marriage to Sophie Christiana 
Lekman led to a happy family life. They had four children, and the only 
son, Heinrich Julius, became a famous Orientalist. 

Martin Heinrich Klaproth made many brilliant contributions to analyti- 
cal and mineralogical chemistry (33), and his papers are assembled in his 
“ Beitrage zur chemischen Kenntniss der Miner alkor per," a six-volume work. 
Although he never discovered an element in the sense of isolating it for the 
first time, his analytical work fore- 
shadowed the discovery of uranium 
and zirconium and verified the dis- 
covery of tellurium and titanium. 

In 1789 he investigated the mineral 
pitchblende, which was then thought 
to be an ore of zinc and iron. When 
he dissolved it in nitric acid, however, 
and neutralized the acid with potash, 
he obtained a yellow precipitate which 
dissolved in excess potash. Klaproth 
concluded correctly that the mineral 
must contain a new element, which 
he named in honor of the new planet, 

Uranus, which Herschel had recently 
discovered (12). He then attempted 
to obtain metallic uranium just as 
Hjelm had prepared metallic molyb- 
denum. By strongly heating an oil 
paste of the yellow oxide in a char- 
coal crucible, he obtained a black 
powder with a metallic luster, and 
thought he had succeeded in isolat- 
ing metallic uranium (29). For over 
fifty years the elementary nature of 
his product was accepted by chemists, but in 1841 Peligot showed that this 
supposed uranium metal was really an oxide. 

When the University of Berlin was founded, Klaproth was sixty-seven 
years old, yet he was appointed as the first professor of chemistry, and 
served in that capacity until his death on January 1, 1817 (13). Thomas 
Thomson mentioned as his most characteristic personal traits: pure love 
of science, intellectual integrity, unselfishness, modesty, friendliness, kind- 
ness, a sense of humor, religious feeling, freedom from superstition, neat- 
ness, and precision (14). 



Martin Heinrich Klaproth 
1743-1817 


German chemist and pharmacist. 
The most distinguished German min er- 
alogical and analytical chemist of his 
time. His careful analyses led to the 
discoveiy of uranium and zirconium 
and verified the discovery of tellurium 
and titanium. He also made pioneer 
researches on ceria. 


132 


Discovery of the Elements 


In 1823 J. A. Arfwedson reduced the green oxide of uranium (then believed 
to be the lowest oxide) with hydrogen, and obtained a brown powder which 
he took to be the metal, but which is now known to be uranous oxide, 
UO 2 (15), (30). In 1841 Peligot, on analyzing anhydrous uranous chlo- 
ride, UCI 4 , found that 100 parts of this chloride apparently yielded about 
110 parts of its elements uranium and chlorine. His explanation of this 

seemingly impossible 
result was that the 
uranous chloride re- 
acts with water in the 
following manner: 

UCh -f 2H 2 0 * 

UO* + 4HC1 

Since uranous oxide 
cannot be reduced 
with hydrogen or car- 
bon, it had always been 
mistaken for metallic 



uranium. 

Peligot then heated 
the anhydrous chloride 
with potassium in a 
closed platinum cru- 
cible. This was heroic 
treatment for the 
platinum, to be sure, 
for the reaction was 
violent enough to 
make crucible and con- 
tents white-hot. How- 

Fr om F er chi' s“V on Libau bis Liebig" eVer » he took 

The Rose Pharmacy in Berlin* care P^ ace small 

Valentin Rose the Elder (1735-1771), his son Valentin crucible inside a larger 
Rose the Younger (1762-1807), and his grandson Heinrich rin<a QT1 j 
R ose (1795-1864) all rendered distinguished service to one ana to remove ms 
chemistry and pharmacy. alcohol lamp as soon 

as the reaction had 

started, Peligot avoided being injured by the pieces of potassium thrown out 
of the crucible. When the violent reaction subsided, he heated the crucible 
strongly to remove the excess potassium and to make the reduced uranium 
coherent. After cooling it, he dissolved out the potassium chloride, and 
obtained a black metallic powder with properties quite different from those 

* Reproduced by courtesy of Mr. Arthur Nemayer, Buchdruckerei und Verlag, 
Mitten wald, Bavaria. 



Eug6ne-Melchior Peligot 133 

formerly attributed to metallic uranium ( 15 ) , ( 31 ). He was evidently the 
first person to isolate this metal. 

Eugene -Melchior Peligot was bom on February 24, 1811, at Paris. He 
studied at the Lycee Henri IV and at the Central School of Arts and Manu- 
factures, but was obliged to leave school for financial reasons. In 1832, 
however, good fortune dawned for him, and he was admitted to the labora- 
tory of the ficole Polytechnique to study under J. B. Dumas. A few 
years later he was collaborating with 
Dumas in important researches in or- 
ganic chemistry. 

For thirty -five consecutive years Peli- 
got occupied the chairs of analytical 
chemistry and glass-making at the Cen- 
tral School of Arts and Manufactures, 
and during this time he wrote an im- 
portant treatise on each of these sub- 
jects. He also lectured to large, 
sympathetic audiences at the Conserva- 
toire des Arts et Metiers, and taught a 
course in agricultural chemical analy- 
sis at the National Agronomic Insti- 
tute. 

He was employed at the Mint for 
forty years, first as assayer, then as 
verifier, and finally as Director of 
Assays. His residence was at the Mint 
also, and it was there that he died in 
1890. According to Tissandier, “his 
life, always calm and methodical, was 
entirely consecrated to the science that 
he loved with passion and to his family 
that he cherished no less” ( 34 ). He 
must have been a man of broad in- 
terests, for he published papers on such 
varied topics as: water analysis, the 
chemical composition of the sugar beet 
and sugar cane, chemical and physiological studies of silk-worms, the com- 
position of Bohemian glass, and researches on uranium and chromium ( 6 ). 

Chromium 

Nicolas-Louis Vauquelin, the discoverer of the metal chromium, was 

* Reproduced by courtesy of Mr. Arthur Nemayer, Buchdruckerei und Verlag, 
Mittenwald, Bavaria. 



From Ferchl’s “Von Libau bis Liebig ’ 


Valentin Rose the Younger 
1762 - 1807 * 

German chemist and apothecary 
who was educated by Klaproth, col- 
laborated with him in his researches 
and verified all his analyses before pub- 
lication. Rose demonstrated the pres- 
ence of chromium in a species of ser- 
pentine. He was the father of Hein- 
rich Rose, the chemist, and Gustav 
Rose, the mineralogist. His father, 
Valentin Rose the Elder, was the dis- 
coverer of the low-melting alloy, Rose’s 
metal. 


134 


Discovery of the Elements 


born on May 16, 1763, in a little Normandy village called St. Andr£ 
d’H£bertot.* As a child he worked in the fields with his father, who 
struggled hard to feed and clothe his large family. The boy made surpris- 
ingly rapid progress in the village school and in the religious studies taught 
him by the cur£, who was very fond of him ( 16 ). At the age of fourteen 
years, young Vauquelin became a laboratory assistant and dishwasher in an 

apothecary shop in Rouen, 
and somewhat later he went 
to Paris with a letter of 
introduction from his old 
cur£ at St. Andr£ d’H^bertot 
to the prior of the order of 
Premontr£. His two best 
friends during his early 
struggles in Paris were this 
venerable prior and Mine. 
Aguesseau, the owner of the 
estate on which the elder 
Vauquelin worked as a peas- 
ant ( 16 ). 

During his first three years 
in the city, the boy worked in 
various apothecary shops, 
and in his leisure moments 
studied Latin and botany. 
One of these pharmacies was 
owned by M. Cheradame, a 
cousin of the famous chemist, 
Antoine-Fran$ois de Four- 
croy. When M. Cheradame 
told Fourcroy about young 
Vauquelin’s fondness for 
chemistry, Fourcroy immedi- 
ately engaged the boy as his 
assistant and took him home. 
Fourcroy’s unmarried sisters 
treated the young assistant with all gentleness and kindness, and on 
one occasion he owed his recovery from a serious illness to their motherly 
care, an act of kindness which he never forgot. 

Vauquelin continued his study of physics, chemistry, and philosophy, and 
assisted Fourcroy in teaching a course at the Athenaeum. He was diffident 
about speaking in public, but as soon as he became acquainted with his new 
♦ Also spelled Saint-Andr6 des Berteaux. 


>y, 

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A**. " 

) itmittfxtly ■ejiibti/hfd mill men qf 
(ghotd Mntope, that it xcouhl Jeetn im- s 
targe on the mafi etwjttmtmUe Jk itl and 


wdoiy: inflating their 


rfyfjkratMh* it is hoped that (he tranf 
A«atytico-<^cmicai EiEiys, Kc. which 
re d ''to K fftf ■jmffintttge if the Kngtt/h 

'jitjiii'fjt&t] jttU the . Et%& of . 
futyect* and which, in 
, tew volumes* 

( : acemmodatio/i if the public* tompriz - :1 ' 

. , , 1 \ , ' 

,• given hopes . 

, ifa gae- mother collection of ‘ 

thej/wift be immediately 


dj dnd a fito tfb# , htyA'4 \ • 

miiu nadtr it ■entpnfUf ^ 


• , Ofifi 5 #^'" * ‘"T V; > , c v, j .j>; *<j . • .• •,« 1 **> y : ■ \ 

fO v'VHV'fc'v M’iy,., (( VAv„.‘, >» •' ! 

v- ■ - * v v’ 


Translator’s Preface to the English Edi- 
tion of Klaproth’s “Analytical Essays to- 
ward Promoting the Chemical Knowledge 
of Mineral Substances’* 




Chromium 


135 




'**# i , I 'IV^Pn&'i [' hi 'tt ft- ; *i ‘ ,• r< 

, jw: $1# j\V '? 




students, he always taught with pleasure and enthusiasm and soon en- 
deared himself to them. 

One of the stirring events of the French Revolution was Vauquelin’s 
rescue, from the mob, of an unfortunate Swiss soldier, who had escaped from 
the Tuileries massacre. Because of his participation in the Revolution, 
Vauquelin had to leave Paris in 1793; however, after serving as pharmacist 
in a military hospital for a 

few months, he returned to p , 1 ":” ' : " ;: "" ;; 1 4 C™" 

Paris to teach chemistry at • 

the Central School of Public : v r • 

Works, which afterward be- ^ 
came the Ecofc Polytechni- 
que. He later became an in- 

spector of mines and professor : ; ' ! - 

of assaying at the School of 

Mines, where he also lived. : J? : 

Out of gratitude to Four 

croy s sisters, who continued AMuPhmuMfo **? dmfajjtol 

to keep house for him even ' ; a«r vmfaAtymk «»*. 

after the death of their Au^*.*i^.W 

Uw C&urfardf, M*y*ut. AiatUmie 4tr WifTcufchafteo *t» Efftttt, <Uir 

brother, Vauquelin placed GtftUfch* » *« k 0 md Hail*, tm#**** | 

most of the apartment at *« «>»<! wMesitu* 

their disposal, and both the '>> }L \ *&*****?* *** H *‘>,p 

sisters lived with him until p v ; ^ ' J 1 * / ;• f 'i 

they died (iff), (35). , , , 

The first analysis of the 
Siberian red lead (now known ;$$$$$ 

as crocoite, or crocoisite) was J ;>£ ) y Z 1$ 

made by Johann Gottlob : '—>«**>*« : v 

Lehmann in 1766 (43). He 

was highly esteemed as di- • 

rector of the Prussian mines v - 

and as a lecturer in Berlin. 

In 1761 he became professor Dedication of the German Edition of 
r - . , , j. . - Scheelb’s Works Edited by HermbstAdt 

of chemistry and director of 

the Royal Museum in St. 

Petersburg, and was commissioned by Catherine II to make extensive 
mineralogical trips throughout the Russian Empire. He described the 
Siberian red lead in a letter to the Comte de Buff on in 1766. At that 
time it was found only at a smelter fifteen versts from Ekaterinstadt 
(Markstadt). In his chemical investigation of it, Lehmann dissolved it 
in hydrochloric acid, noticed the emerald-green color of its (reduced) 
solution, and found that the mineral contained lead. He concluded 


lIMipfcpEiNHICfiK 

JPrdWfer d*T . 

fa* 

' AJUkrni* 4*t JUwlk mi i 
«lw Cbwtfafa Miitttiu AlA4*mied^r'Wt£tu{ch^ftta 
Mftufcrftua Ml OtftllffiMt HaUc 

Aec 4«r >rftae«irt«** ‘V-v- 

. ' ' _ BeHJA 4H1U ■ _ /v 

v; } v/i*li *in*n 

-pi' V' .J. i( 

f’. ^ ^?v ? rt'* W.'; ■ ■/* ; ,/;,f * a* ’ 




Dedication of the German Edition of 
Scheelb’s Works Edited by HermbstAdt 




136 


Discovery of the Elements 


that it must be “a lead mineralized with a selenitic spar and iron particles” 
( 44 ). In 1767 his life was suddenly cut short by the bursting of a retort in 





Eugene Peligot 
1811-1890 


Professor of analytical chemistry 
and glass-making at the Central 
School of Arts and Manufactures in 
Paris. Director of assays at the 
Paris Mint. Professor of agricultural 
chemical analysis at the National 
Agronomic Institute. The first to 
isolate the metal uranium. 

pyramids of it attached like little 
rubies to quartz. When pulverized, 
it gives a handsome yellow guhr which 
could be used in miniature paint- 
ing .... It is difficult today to pro- 
cure enough of it for large-scale as- 
says, for the part of the mine where 
this lead ore is found is seldom 
worked, for lack of air ... . Five 
hundred workmen are now employed 
in these mines . . ( 46 ). 

Peter Simon Pallas (1741-1811) 
was a native of Berlin. He was 
broadly educated in medicine, natural 


which he was heating some arsenic ( 45 ). 

In 1770 P. S. Pallas described the 
Beresof gold mines near Ekaterinburg, 
Siberia. On the 25th and 26th of June 
of that year he wrote: “The Beresof 
pits include four mines, which have 
been worked since 1752.” The Beresof 
mine also yielded copper, lead, and 
silver. “A very remarkable red lead 
mineral is also exploited there,” said 
Pallas, “which has never been found in 
any other mine of the Empire or else- 
where. This lead ore is heavy, of 
varying color (sometimes like that of 
cinnabar), and semi-transparent . . . . 
One also finds small irregular, tortuous 



Nicolas-Louis Vauquelin 
1763-1829 

French analytical and mineralogi- 
cal chemist and apothecary of the 
Revolutionary Period. Professor at 
the fecole Polytechnique and at the 
School of Mines. Assayer at the Paris 
Mint. In 1767 he discovered chro- 
mium and beryllium. 



Chromium 


137 


sciences, and modern languages, which he studied in Berlin, Halle, Gottin- 
gen, the Netherlands, and England. From 1768 until 1774 he made ex- 
tended journeys at the request of Catherine II and suffered great privations 
in order to study the natural history of Siberia, the Altai Mountains, the 
lower Volga region, and the southern part of European Russia (47), (48), (49). 

In 1798 N.-L. Vauquelin analyzed crocoite and gave a detailed account 
of its history. “All the specimens of this substance which are to be found 
in the several mineralogical cabinets in Europe/ ’ said he, “were obtained 
from this [Beresof] gold mine; which indicates that it was formerly abun- 
dant; but it is said that for some 
years past it has become very scarce, 
and that at present it is bought for its 
weight in gold, especially if pure and 
regularly formed. The specimens 
which do not possess the regular 
figure, or are broken into fragments, 
are appropriated to painting, in which 
art this substance is of high value for 
its beautiful orange-yellow colour, its 
unchangeableness in the air, and the 
facility with which it can be levigated 
with oil” (36). 

“The beautiful red colour, trans- 
parency, and crystalline figure of the 
Siberian red lead,” continued Vau- 
quelin, “soon induced mineralogists 
and chemists to make enquiries into 
its nature. The place of its discovery, 
its specific gravity, and the lead ore 
which accompanies it produced an im- 
mediate suspicion of the presence of 
that metal; but, as lead had never 
been found in possession of the characteristic properties of this Siberian ore, 
they thought, with justice, that it was mineralised by some other substance; 
and Lehmann, who first subjected it to chemical analysis, asserted, in a 
Latin dissertation printed at Petersburgh in 1766 . . . that the mineralisers 
were arsenic and sulphur” (36). When Vauquelin and Macquart analyzed 
it, they found it to consist of lead peroxide, iron, and aluminum. Bindheim 
of Moscow reported, however, that it contained molybdic acid, nickel, 
cobalt, iron, and copper. To settle this question Vauquelin in 1797 re- 
peated the analysis (32). When he boiled the pulverized mineral with two 
parts of potassium carbonate, he obtained lead carbonate and a yellow 
solution containing the potassium salt of an unknown acid. This solution 



The Naturalist's Library, vol. 9 

Peter Simon Pallas 
1741-1811 

German scientist who made extensive 
scientific journeys to study the natural 
history of Russia and Siberia. He de- 
scribed the Beresof gold mines and the 
14 Siberian red lead” (crocoite) in 1770. 



138 


Discovery of the Elements 


gave a beautiful red precipitate when added to the solution of a mercuric 
salt and a yellow precipitate when added to a lead solution. He noticed also 
that when he isolated the 

. - - - , , , Cet omrace rtf nus sous la same-eard* <!c la !*»«. 

new acid and added stan- t * 

<1 .* .v i Tous lrso**mplaires sont signes par l\Antemet fliiip, im>» . 


Fourcroy Autograph from His “ Systeme des Con - 
naissances Chimiqties ” 


. - - * , , . wniucr i-a* mi* u >amc-Earur mr pa i«ti. 

new acid and added stan- t * 

nous chloride the solu TouslcsiUtempUiirssoiitsignespaiTAntemet Hiuju m»- »» . 

tion became green (re- . 

duction of chromic acid S S/I 

to a chromic salt) (17). jf y £ /Jaudatungfafi 

In the following year ^ 

Vauquelin succeeded in ^ 

isolating the new metal. Fourcroy Autograph from His “Systeme des Con - 
After removing the lead naissances Chimiqties ” 

in the Siberian red lead 

by precipitation with hydrochloric acid, he evaporated the filtrate to obtain 
the chromium trioxide, which he put into a charcoal crucible placed inside a 

large earthen one filled with charcoal 
dust. After heating it intensely for 
half an hour, he allowed it to cool. 
The inner crucible was found to be 
^ filled with a network of gray, inter- 
lacing metallic needles which weighed 
one-third as much as the original 
chromium trioxide that had been re- 
duced. Because of its many colored 
compounds Fourcroy and Haiiy sug- 
gested the name chromium for the 
new metal (17), (36). 

Vauquelin taught for a time at the 
College de France and at thejardin des 
, , Plantes, and in 1811, upon the death 

of his old friend and teacher, M. Four- 
croy, he became his successor as pro- 

Antoine-Francois de Fourcrov fessor of chemistry in the School of 
1765-1809 Medicine. In 1828 the Department 

French chemist of the Revolutionary of Calvados, in which his native village 

St- d’Hftntot is situated, 
Lavoisier, de Morveau, and Berthollet he appointed him as one of its deputies. 

He discharged the duties of this office 
analyzed many reagents and medicinals with honor, striving always for the 

best interests of his beloved Republic. 
Although his early days were spent in poverty and toil, he became a man 
of broad culture, took pleasure in music and literature, and frequently 
quoted his favorite authors, Horace and Virgil (Id). 


Antoinb-Francois de Fourcroy 
1765-1809 

French chemist of the Revolutionary 
Period. Defender of Lavoisier's views 
on combustion. In collaboration with 
Lavoisier, de Morveau, and Berthollet he 
carried out a reform of chemical no- 
menclature. Fourcroy prepared and 
analyzed many reagents and medicinals 


Nicolas-Louis Vauquelin 


139 


M. Chevallier, one of his students, recalled an incident that well 
illustrates Professor Vauquelin’s kindness. In 1808 Bonaparte ordered the 
arrest and deportation of all Spaniards living in Paris. One of the sixty 
who were seized and taken to the prefecture of police was a young man who 
had recently come to study under Professor Vauquelin and who had no 
other protector in Paris. Vauquelin started out before six o'clock next 
morning, dressed in the uniform worn on formal occasions by members of 
the Institute, went to the police station, and succeeded in having the boy 
released. This young Spaniard, who 
was named Orfila, afterward made a 


name for himself in chemistry (16), 

(35). 

Sir Humphry Davy once gave the 
following amusing description of Vau- 
quelin’s home life: 

Vauquelin was in the decline of 
life when I first saw him in 1813 
—a man who gave me the idea 
of the French chemists of an- 
other age; belonging rather to 
the pharmaceutical laboratory 
than to the philosophical one; 
yet he lived in the Jardin du Roi. 

Nothing could be more singular 
than his manners, his life, and 
his manage. Two old maiden 
ladies, the Mademoiselles de 
Fourcroy, sisters of the profes- 
sor of that name, kept his house. 

I remember the first time that I 
entered it, I was ushered into a 
sort of bed-chamber, which like- 
wise served as a drawing-room. 

One of the ladies was in bed, 
but employed in preparations for the kitchen; and was actually 
paring truffles. Vauquelin wished some immediately to be dressed 
for my breakfast, and I had some difficulty to prevent it (IS). 



M ATHIEU-J OSEPH-BONA VENTURE ORFILA 

1787-1853 

Spanish chemist who studied un- 
der Vauquelin in Paris. The founder 
of modern toxicology. Professor of 
toxicology, medical chemistry, and 
forensic chemistry in Paris. 


This was, to be sure, an unusual way of receiving a fashionable English 
gentleman, but perhaps if Sir Humphry had known the pleasing story of 
Vauquelin’s gratitude to the two old ladies who* had befriended him in 
youth, he would not have been so critical. 

Vauquelin in France and Klaproth in Germany were the outstanding 
analytical chemists of their day, and were, in fact, two of the greatest 
analysts of all time. According to Thomson, Vauquelin was “by far the 
most industrious of all French chemists” (19). He died in his native 
district at the Ch&teau des Berteaux on November 14, 1829. 



140 


Discovery of the Elements 


Chromium has taken its place among the world's useful metals, and 
stainless steel, chromium-plated hardware and automobile trimmings, and 
artistic chromium jewelry now bear witness to the importance of Vauquelin's 
discovery. 


Literature Cited 

(1) Vallery-Radot, R., “Life of Pasteur,” English translation by Mrs. Devonshire, 
Doubleday, Page and Co., New York, 1926, p. 152. 

(2) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chiinie,” Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp, 
344-5. 

(2) Nordenskiold, A. E., “C. W. Scheele’s nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeich- 
nungen,” Norstedt & Soner, Stockholm, 1892, pp. 362-3. 

(4) Ibid.,p.Z70. 

(5) Del Rio, A. M., “Analysis of an alloy of gold and rhodium from the parting 
house at Mexico,” Annals of Phil., 10, 256 (Oct., 1825). 

( 6 ) Poggendorff, J. C., “Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichte 
der exakten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Articles on d'Elhuyar and Peligot. 

(7) NordenskiOld, A. E., “Scheele’s nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnungen,” ref 

(3), pp. 373-4. 

(8) Ibid., pp. 399-400. 

(9) Ibid., p. 389. Letter of Mar. 13, 1780. 

(10) Ibid., p. 381. 

(11) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” Vol. 2, Colburn and Bentley, 
London, 1931, pp. 192-3. 

(12) FArbbr, E., “Geschichtliche Entwicklung der Chemie,” Springer, Berlin, 1921, 
p. 65. 

(13) Buggb, G., “Das Buch der grossen Chemiker,” Vol. 1, Verlag Chemie, Berlin, 
1929, p. 334. 

(14) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” ref. (II), Vol. 2, pp. 197-8. 

(15) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (2), Vol. 2, pp. 322-4. 

(16) “Biographic Universelle, Ancienne et Modeme,” 85 vols., Michaud Frires, 
Paris, 1813. Article on Vauquelin by Chevallier. 

(17) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (2), Vol. 2, pp. 317-8. 

(18) Davy, Dr. John, “Memoirs of the Life of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.,” Smith, 
Elder and Co., London, 1839, p. 166. 

(19) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” ref. (11), Vol. 2, p. 212. 

(20) Scheblb, C. W., “Sammtliche physische und chemische Werke,” translated into 
German by Hermbstadt, zweite unveranderte Auflage, Vol. 2, Mayer and Muller, 
Berlin, 1793, pp. 291-302. 

(21) Bergman, T., “Opuscula Physica et Chemica,” Vol. 6, Libraria I. G. Mtilleriana, 
Lipsiae, 1790, pp. 108-9. 

(22) Gmblin, L. “Handbuch der theoretischen Chemie,” ersten Bandes zweite Abthei- 
lung, dritte A ullage, Varrentrapp, Frankfurt am Main, 1826, p. 789. 

(23) Schbble, C. W., “S&mmtliche physische und chemische Werke,” ref. (20), pp. 
186-200. 

(24) Hjblm, P. J., “Versuche mit Wasserbley, zur Darstellung desselben in metallischer 
Gestalt,” Cr ell's Ann., 13, 39-45 (1790) ; “Versuche mit Wasserbley und Wieder- 
herstellung seiner Erde,” ibid., IS, 179-85, 248-80, 353-63, 429-48 (1791). 



Literature Cited 141 

( 25 ) Klaproth, M. H. and F. Wolff, “Dictionnaire de Chimie,” Klostermann Fils, 
Paris, 1811, Article on “Scheelium.” 

(26) D’Elhuyar, F. and J. J., "A Chemical Analysis of Wolfram and Examination of 
a New Metal Which Enters into Its Composition,” translated from the Spanish 
by Ch. Cullen. Preface by Bergman. London, 1785. German translation by 
Gren (Halle, 1786). 

(27) Bergman’s Autobiography, translated by H. N. Barham and A. E. Pearson 
from original manuscript in Upsala Univ. Library, x.2551. 

(28) Lagrange, Count J.-L., '’Notice des Travaux de Bertrand Pelletier,” Ann . chim. 
phys., 27, 199-200 (1797); Charles Pelletier and Sbdillot Jeune “M6moires 
et observations de chimie de Bertrand Pelletier,” Croullebois, Fuchs, Barrois and 
Huzard, Paris, 1798 (an VI), Vol. 1, pp. 146-224. “M6moire sur l’analyse de la 
plombagine et de la molybctene.” 

(29) Klaproth, M. H., “Chemische Untersuchung des Uranits, einer neuentdeckten 
metallischen Substanz,” CrelVs Ann., 12, 387-403 (1789). 

( 30 ) Arfvedson, J. A., “Recherches sur l’Urane,” Ann. chim. phys ., [2], 29, 148-75 
(1825). 

(31) Peligot, E., "Sur le poids atomique de l’Urane,” Compt. rend., 12, 735-7 (1841); 
“Recherches sur l’Urane,” Compt. rend., 13, 417-26 (1841); “Recherches sur l’Ura- 
nium,” Ann. chim. phys., [3], 5, 5-47 (May, 1842); [3], 12, 549-74 (Dec., 1844). 

(32) Vauquelin, N.-L., “Memoire sur une nouvelle substance m£tallique contenue 
dans le plomb rouge de Siberie, et qu’on propose d’appeler Chrome, k cause de la 
propri£t£ qu’il a de colorer les combinaisons ou il entre,” Ann. chim . phys., [1 ], 
25, 21-31, 194-204 (Jan., 1798). 

(33) Meyer, R. “M. H. Klaproth, ein deutscher Chemiker des 18. Jahrhunderts,” 
Z. angew. Chem., 34, 1-3 (Jan. 4, 1921). 

(34) Tissandier, G., “Eugene Peligot,” La Nature, [1], 18, 521-2 (April 26, 1890). 

(35) Dains, F. B., “John Griscom and his impressions of foreign chemists in 1818- 
19,” J. Chem. Edtjc., 8, 1288-310 (July, 1931). 

(36) Vauquelin, N.-L., “Memoir on a new metallic acid which exists in the red lead 
of Siberia,” Nicholson's J ., 2, 145-6 (July, 1798); “Analysis of the red lead of 
Siberia, with experiments on the new metal it contains,” ibid., 2, 387-93 (Dec., 
1798). 

(37) Weeks, M. E., “The scientific contributions of the de Elhuyar Brothers,” J. 
Chem. Educ., 11, 413-9 (July, 1934). 

(38) de GAlvbz-CaRbro, A., “Apuntes biogr&ficos de D. Fausto de Elhuyar,” Boletin 
del Instituto Geologico y Minero de Espafia, Vol. 53, Graficas reunidas, Madrid, 
1933, 253 pp. 

(39) von Crell, L., “Zum Andenken Torbem Bergmanns,” Crell's Ann., 7, 74-96 
(1787). 

(40) Dann, G. E., “Pharmaziegeschichtliches aus den Vorstudien zur Biographie 
Klaproths,” Pharmazeutische Ztg ., 72, 549-52 (May 7, 1927). 

(41) Hjelm, P. J., "Aminnelse-tal dfver Herr Torbern Olof Bergman,” J. G. Lange. 
Stockholm, 1786, p. 86. 

(42) Hjelm, P. J., “Versuche mit Wasserbley, zur Darstellung desselben in metallis- 
cher Gestalt,” CrelVs Ann., 13, 39-45, 140-50 (1790). 

(43) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Chemie,” Fr. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 1847, 
vol. 4, p. 81; P. I. Valdbn, “Science and Life,” Petrograd, 1918, Part 1, pp. 81-8 
(In Russian); Mineralogical Abstracts , 2, 483 (1925). 

(44) von Kobell, Franz, “Geschichte der Mineralogie von 1650-1860,” J. G. Cotta, 
Munich, 1864 , pp. 611-2. 



142 Discovery of the Elements 

(45) “Allgemeine deutsche Biographie,” Duncker and Humblot, Leipzig, 1883, vol. 
18, pp. 140-1; J. C. Poggendorff, “Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch 
der exacten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937, Vol. 1, columns 409-10. Articles on J. G. Lehmann. 

(46) Gauthier de la Peyronie, “Voyages de M. P. S. Pallas en difterentes provinces 
de FEmpire de Russie et dans l’Asie septentrionale," Maradan, Paris, 1789, Vol. 
2, pp. 225-37. 

(47) Poggendorff, J. C., ref. (45), Vol. 2, column 348. Article on P. S. Pallas. 

(48) Smith, E. C., “P. S. Pallas, 1741-1811,“ Nature, 148, 334-5 (Sept. 20, 1941). 

(49) Gauthier de la Peyronie, ref. (46), Vol. 1, p. iii. 

(50) Pott, J. H., “Chemische Untersuchung des Wasserbleyes," Cr ell's Neues chem. 
Archiv, 3, 284-8 (1785); Abh. konigl. Akad. Wiss. (Berlin), 1735-42, p. 29. 

(51) Qvist, Bengt, “Untersuchung vom Wasserbleye," Crell's Neues chem. Archiv, 8, 
238-49 (1791); Abh. K. Schvved. Akad. (Stockholm), 1754, p. 192. 

(52) Nordenskiold, A. E., ref. (3), pp. 200-4, 332-6, 399-400. 

(53) Dobbin, L., “Collected Papers of C. W. Scheele," G. Bell and Sons, London, 
1931, pp. 186-94; C. W. Scheele, K. Vet. Acad. Handl., 39, 247-55 (1778). 

(54) “Mynt-Guardien Petter Jacob Hjelms biographie," ibid., 1813, pp. 280-3. 

(55) Clarke, E. D., “Travels in Various Countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa," T. 
Cadell, London, 1824, Vol. 9, pp. 203-5. 

(56) Dobbin, L., ref. (53), pp. 225-9; C. W. Scheele, K. Vet. Acad. Nya Handl., 2, 
89-95 (1781). 

(57) Bergman, T., “Vom Schwersteine," Crell's Ann., 1, 44-8 (1784). 

(5c?) Koppel, I., “Beitrag zur Entdeckuugsgeschichte des Wolframs," Chem. Ztg., 50, 
969-71 (Dec. 25, 1926). 

(59) “Vom Hrn. Raspe in Cornwall," Crell's Ann., 3, 546-9 (1785). 

(60) “Letter from J. Hawkins in Braunschweig," ibid., 4, 340-1 (1785). 

(61) Van Doren, Carl, “Benjamin Franklin," Viking Press, New York, 1938, p. 357. 

(62) “Biographie Universelle," L. G. Michaud, Paris, 1824, vol. 37, pp. 119-20; “All- 
gemeine Deutsche Biographie," ref. (45), Vol. 23, pp. 2-3. Biographical sketches 
of R. E. Raspe. 

(63) Gren, F. C., “Principles of Modern Chemistry," T. Cadell, Jun. and W. Davies, 
London, 1800, Vol. 2, p. 422. 

(64) “Infusibility of tungsten," Nicholson's J., 4, 191-2 (July, 1800). 

(65) Woulfe, Peter, “Experiments on some mineral substances." Phil. Trans., 69, 
26-7 (1779). 




VIII. THE SCIENTIFIC CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE 
DE ELHUYAR BROTHERS* 


Although Don Fausto de Elhuyar f and his brother , Don Juan JosS } achieved 
undying fame by their isolation of the element now known as tungsten , only 
meager accounts of their contributions have been recorded in the English 
language , and even in Spanish and Spanish- A merican journals it is difficult 
to find more than brief mention of Don Juan JosL This Castilian literature , 
however , contains a wealth of information about the scientific activities of Don 
Fausto } and the observance of the centenary of his death brought forth new bio- 
graphical material. 


In the latter part of the eighteenth century the Count of Pefiaflorida, 
with the approval of King Charles III, founded in the Basque provinces a 
patriotic organization known as “The Basque Society of Friends of their 
Country” (Sociedad Vascongada de Amigos del Pais). In the early days of 
its existence, this learned society, consisting of studious men of the nobility 
and clergy, used to meet every evening in the week. On Mondays they 
discussed mathematics; on Tuesdays they made experiments with Abb£ 
Nollet’s electrical machine or with their air pump from London or dis- 
cussed the physical theories of the day, such as Franklin's views on elec- 
tricity ; on Wednesdays they read history and translations by members of 
the society; on Thursdays they listened to music; on Fridays they studied 
geography; on Saturdays they conversed on current events ; and on Sun- 
days they again listened to music. According to a contemporary writer, 
Don Juan Sempere y Guarinos (1) : 

The two most glorious monuments of the Sociedad Vascongada are 
the Seminary of Vergara and the House of Mercy of Vitoria... This 
Seminary was the first in Spain in which virtue was united with the 
teaching of the sciences most useful to the state. Vergara was the first 
town in which chairs of chemistry and metallurgy were founded. 

Soon after this Seminary was founded in 1777, two brilliant and promis- 
ing youths of Basque and French lineage, Don Juan Jos£ de Elhuyar y de 
Zubice and his younger brother, Don Fausto, were commissioned to study 
abroad. Don Juan Jos£ was sent by the King to master the science of 
metallurgy and Don Fausto was chosen by the Count of Pefiaflorida to 
study mineralogy at the expense of the Society of ^Friends of their Country 
and become the first professor of that subject at the new Seminary ( 2 ). 

Don Fausto was bom at Logrofio in northern Spain on October 11, 1755, 
and was educated in Paris under the best masters. While the gifted young 
* Presented before the Division of History of Chemistry at the Chicago meeting of the 
A. C. S., Sept. 11, 1933. 

t Even in Spanish literature, the spelling of this name varies. 

143 



144 


Discovery of the Elements 


Louis- Joseph Proust (3), who later defended the law of definite proportions 
so valiantly against Berthollet, taught chemistry at Vergara, Don Fausto 
and Don Juan Jos4 went to Freiberg, where in 1778 they enrolled as stu- 
dents in the Royal School of Mines, studied subterranean geometry, min- 
ing, metallurgy, and machine construction, and became ardent disciples of 
the great mineralogist Abraham Gottlob Werner. They also visited the 
mines and metallurgical industries of Sweden and England, and at least one 
of the brothers profited by a brief course of study at Upsala under the 
celebrated Torbern Bergman. 



Courtesy Dr Moles and Mr.deG6lvez-Cafte.ro 

The Seminary of Vergara 


It was here that Don Juan Jose and Don Fausto de Elhuyar carried out their re- 
markable analysis of wolframite, which resulted in the isolation of a new metal, “ wolf- 
ram, or tungsten. Among the professors at this Seminary were L.-J. Proust, Francois 
Chabaneau, and Fausto de Elhuyar. 

When Don Fausto took up his teaching duties at Vergara just after the 
Christmas vacation in 1781,* he was already famous because of his achieve- 
ments in northern Europe. He soon published papers on the manufacture 
of tin plate, the mines of Somorrostro, the iron-works of Biscaya, and the 
working of copper mines. 

Soon after devoting themselves to laboratory research in Vergara, the de 
Elhuyar brothers analyzed a specimen of wolframite from a tin mine in 
Zinhwald and separated from it an insoluble yellow powder which they 

* The author wishes to correct a statement in Reference 8. Elhuyar taught at Vergara 
before going to Mexico, not after his return. 




Tungsten 


145 


called wolframic acid 
and which they later 
showed to be identical 
with tungstic acid. 

Since these Spanish 
chemists were the first 
to reduce wolframic 
acid, Dr. E. Moles of 
the University of Ma- 
drid and the late Dr. 

Fages y Virgili have 
pointed out that the 
metal ought to be called 
by the name wolfra- 
mium {wolfram) which 
the de Elhuyar brothers 
gave it. Although this 
name (4) has been 
changed in some lan- 
guages to forms derived 
from tungstein , the ac- 
cepted international 
symbol, W, still bears 
witness that the metal 
was first obtained from 
wolframite, not from 
tungstein (scheelite). 

Although the isola- 
tion of this metal has 
sometimes been erro- 
neously credited to Don 
Fausto alone, the original paper published in 1783 in the Extractos de las 
Juntas Generates of the Royal Basque Society under the title 4 ‘Chemical 
Analysis of Wolfram and Examination of a new Metal which Enters 
into its Composition” bore the names of both brothers. Because of the 
great importance of this memoir it was soon translated into French, Eng- 
lish, and German (5). * 

Dr. Fages and Dr. Moles have both pointed out that, in isolating the new 
metal, the de Elhuyar brothers did much more than merely confirm the 
hypothesis of Bergman. Instead of analyzing tungstic acid intentionally 
prepared to test this hypothesis, as has so often been stated, they analyzed 
wolfram without any preconceived ideas. Dr. Fages stated that, after the 
de Elhuyar brothers had discovered the add in wolframite : 



Courtesy Dr. Moles and Mr. de G&lvez-Caftero 

Fausto de Elhuyar, 1755-1833, as He Appeared 
While Studying in Vienna before Going to Mexico 

At this period he was already famous because of the 
research at Vergara in which he and his brother liber- 
ated the element now known as tungsten. This por- 
trait was bequeathed to the Mining Council by Don 
Fausto’s daughter, Dona Luisa de Elhuyar de Martinez 
de Arag6n. 


146 


Discovery of the Elements 



. ..their great en- 
lightenment and 
erudition, support- 
ing their great 
genius, caused 
them to suppose 
that the earth en- 
countered, com- 
pletely new to 
them and to almost 
all chemists, might 
be the same that 
Scheele had dis- 
covered a few 
months before in 
another mineral, 
entirely independ- 
ently. . .(4), (6). 

The de Elhuyar 
brothers concluded 
from their analysis 
that wolframite is 
composed of wolf- 
ramie acid com- 
bined with iron and 
manganese. Their 
method of obtaining 

From F . G. Corning , “ A Student Reverie” the metal by TeduC- 

Abraham Gottlob Werner, 1750-1817 tion of tungstic 

Professor of geognosy at the Freiberg School of Mines. (wolframic) acid 
Because his followers believed in the aqueous origin of rocks, . ' 

they were called Neptunists. Among his distinguished stu- with charcoal has 
dents were the de Elhuyar brothers, Baron Alexander von heen described in 
Humboldt, and A. M. del Rio, the discoverer of vanadium 

(erythronium). other papers (4), (6), 

(7), (S). As late as 

1786 the great analytical chemist, Martin Heinrich Klaproth, admitted that 
all his own attempts had failed and that “up to the present only Hr. 
Elhuyar has succeeded in getting the metal” (9). 

Although the de Elhuyar brothers were unsuccessful in their attempts to 
synthesize wolframite, they foreshadowed modern methods of mineral 
synthesis (5). They also devised an ingenious method of determining the 
specific gravity of solids, and their values for wolframite, tungsten tri- 
oxide, and metallic tungsten were surprisingly accurate (2), Their disser- 
tation on wolframite, published three-quarters of a century before Thomas 
Graham founded the science of colloid chemistry, contains a clear de- 
scription of a wolf ramie (tungstic) acid sol (2). Spanish writers have 


Tungsten 


147 


commented on the 
lucid and refined 
style of this great 
memoir, which, 
though written in 
the phraseology of 
the phlogistonists, 
exhibits scientific 
concepts and tech- 
nic which are as- 
tonishingly mod- 
ern. In the French 
translation of it, 
the de Elhuyar 
brothers modestly 
admit that no use 
has yet been found 
for the new metal, 
but add that “we 
must not conclude 
from this that it is 
entirely useless” 

( 3 ). 

In the meantime, 
events in the west- 
ern hemisphere had 
caused King 
Charles to make Don Andr£s Manuel del Rio,* 1764-1849 

new nlans for the Professor of mineralogy, French, and Spanish at the School 
a T?ru u u ° ’f Mines of Mexico. Member of the American Philosophical 

de Elhuyar broth- Society. He discovered the element vanadium (erythro- 

ers. As early as nium), but later confused it with chromium. This portrait 

„ ' . _ _ J , belongs to the School of Mines of Mexico. 

1774 Don Joaquin 

de Velazquez Cardenas y Le6n had presented a plan for the establishment 
of a school of mines at Mexico City which had received the King's approval. 
However, the realization of the plan had unfortunately been deferred by 
the death in 1786 of this distinguished Mexican scientist. In order to 
fulfill his cherished hope of developing the mines of America, King Charles 
sent Don Juan Josd to New Granada (Colombia) and Don Fausto to 
Hungary and Germany to prepare himself for the exacting duties of Direc- 
tor General of Mines of Mexico ( 2 ), (< 6 ). 

* The author wishes to thank Sefior Pablo Martinez del Rio, head of the Extension 
Dept, of the National University of Mexico, for his kind assistance in locating this por- 
trait. 



148 


Discovery of the Elements 


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The former served 
for many years as 
professor of mineral- 
ogy, successfully ad- 
ministered technical 
commissions of great 
responsibility, and 
developed the mines 
of New Granada. 
Early in the spring 
of 1786 Don Fausto 
collaborated with 
Fran gois Chabaneau , 
professor of chemis- 
try at Vergara, in 
some remarkable re- 
searches on plati- 
num. In a letter 
written in Vergara 
on March 17th of 
that year to Don 
_ „ _ . Juan Jos£, who was 

Courtesy F. B. Dams J 

Baron Alexander von Humboldt, 1769-1859 then living in Bo- 

German naturalist and traveler. Author of “Kosmos” gotd, Colombia, Don 
and “Political Essay on New Spain.” Friend of Fausto de Fausto crave a clear 
Elhuyar and A. M. del Rio. ® 

description of their 

process for making pure platinum malleable. In his bibliography of 
Spanish science, Men£ndez y Pelayo mentions a paper on locating veins 
of mercury which Don Juan Jos4 published in the same year (10). 

Don Juan Jos£ was a highly esteemed friend of the great Spanish bota- 
nist, Don Jos4 Celestino Mutis, who once said proudly, “I have been the 
instrument for the glorious acquiring of the two learned D'Elhuyar [sic] 
brothers and the rapid introduction of Baron Born's new mining process" 
(11). In 1932 the Republic of Colombia celebrated the bicentenary 
of the birth of this great Spanish botanist (12). According to Dr. Pages, 
many documents preserved with the famous Mutis collection at the Botani- 
cal Garden in Madrid show that the services of Don Juan Jos4 in New 
Granada were no less useful to Spain than those of his younger brother in 
Mexico. Don Juan Jos£ de Elhuyar died in 1804 in the Santa Ana mine 
at Bogota, without ever revisiting his native land (6), (II). 

On May 22, 1783, while the de Elhuyar brothers were still engrossed in 
their famous experiments on wolframite, the King had issued his "Royal 
Ordinances for the Direction, Management, and Government of the 


The db Elhuyar Brothers 


149 


Important Body of Mining in New Spain and of its Royal General Tri- 
bunal (13)” In the spring of 1786 Don Fausto de Elhuyar was sent to 
Hungary and Germany to study the new method of amalgamation which 
Counselor Born had established in Schemnitz and Freiberg. On July 18th 
of that year the Marquis of Sonora wrote as follows to Don Fausto, who 
was then in Vienna : 

The King has deigned to appoint Your Excellency as Director Gen- 
eral of the Royal Assembly of Mines of Mexico with a salary of 4000 
pesos, and by his Royal command I give you this order for your satis- 
faction, and that, well informed on the new method of amalgamation 
that Mr. Bom invented, you may return to those realms at your earli- 
est convenience in order to go to New Spain and fill that office with the 
intelligence and knowledge which the discharge of your obligation de- 
mands and which His Majesty expects from your application, profi- 
ciency, and zeal (13). 

After a year and a half in Hungary and Germany, Professor Elhuyar spent 
a few months in Vienna studying the mines of the surrounding region and 
the metallurgy of many metals and enjoying the brilliant social life of the 
city. Before returning to Spain he married a German lady of distinguished 
lineage, Juana Raab de Moncelos, who, in the middle of June, 1788, set sail 
with him from Cadiz for New Spain (II), {21). 

When the frigate Venus cast anchor at Vera Cruz on September 4th of 
that year, the new Director General of Mines disembarked and went im- 
mediately to Mexico City. After a solemn and colorful ceremony in the 
Royal Palace, he entered at once into his new duties. 

A few months later, as a first step in the construction of a chemical lab- 
oratory, assay furnaces were built in the patio of the college building. 
According to Director Elhuyar’s plan, the students admitted were to range 
in age from fifteen to twenty years and were to wear a prescribed blue uni- 
form with red collar and cuffs and gold buttons decorated with the signs 
for gold, silver, and mercury. On Sundays and church holidays they were 
expected to attend the church functions, both morning and afternoon, and 
to call on the mining officials “in order to learn the usages of polite society 
(13)” As an incentive to scholarship, the Director arranged that prizes 
for good conduct and industry should be awarded with great solemnity. 
These consisted of ornaments to be worn in the buttonhole (13). The 
School of Mines was officially opened on New Yehr’s Day, 1792, with an 
impressive ceremony in the Church of San Nicolas. It was the first scien- 
tific institution to be erected on Mexican soil (14). 

The new Director of Mines made a thorough experimental study of the 
“patio,” or cold amalgamation, process of separating silver from its ores. 
Although this empirical process invented by Bartolom£ de Medina had 
been used for more than two centuries, no satisfactory explanation of the 



150 


Discovery of the Elements 


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Dedication of the History of the College of Mines 
of Mexico (Ref. 13) 

Translation : “To the illustrious memory of the emi- 
nent scientists who filled with exceptional ability the im- 
portant office of First Director General of Mining, D. 
Joaquin de Vel&zquez Cardenas y Leon and D. Fausto de 
Eihuyar, the former the initiator and the latter the 
founder of the College of Mines. In testimony of af- 
fection, admiration, and gratitude.” 


chemical reactions in- 
volved had yet been 
given. L.-J. Proust, 
who was then teach- 
ing in the Academy 
of Artillery at Sego- 
via, reviewed these re- 
markable experiments 
of Eihuyar in volume 
one of the Amies del 
Real Laboratorio de 
Quimica in 1791. The 
late Sefior J. R. Mou- 
relo once stated that 
. . the glory of 
both [Bartolom6 de 
Medina and Alvaro 
Alonso Barba] shines 
and scintillates more 
brightly in that of . . . 
the famous mining en- 
gineer, Don Fausto 
Eihuyar, in whom ap- 
pears completed . . . 
the magnificent work 
of those eminent 
miners . . (15). 

Since a royal order, 
transmitted through 
the Viceroy of Mexico, 
had decreed that Wer- 
ner’s theory of the 
formation of veins be 
taught to the stu- 
dents, the brilliant 


young Don Andrfe Manuel del BJio was sent to Mexico to introduce 
the most approved mining methods which he had learned at Freiberg 
(IS). Although del Rio had declined the professorship of chemistry, he 
accepted that of mineralogy, and took with him on the warship San Pedro 
Alc&ntara a quantity of equipment for the . School of Mines. Soon after 
hjs arrival in Mexico City in December, 1794, Don Fausto de Eihuyar 
asked him to translate Werner’s book on the theory of formation of veins 
into Spanish (15), 




Fausto de Elhuyar and the Mines of Mexico 


151 


When Sefior Elhu- 
yar’s nine-year term 
as Director was about 
to expire in 1797, his 
colleagues and stu- 
dents requested that 
he be reappointed for 
another nine years, or 
for life, or for what- 
ever period might 
meet with Royal favor 
(13). The report 
stated that . . this 
Royal Seminary is 
persuaded that in this 
kingdom there is no 
other subject of the 
merit and circum- 
stances so suited to 
this institution. . . as 
Sr. D. Fausto Eluyar 
[sic].” The officers 
of the school felt that 
no one else “would 
recognize the char- 
acter and genius of 
the [Mexican] people. * ' 
The association of 



Fausto de Elhuyar, Director General of Mines of 
Spain 

The centenary of his death was observed in 1933 at 
the School of Mining Engineering of Madrid. 


mining engineers from all parts of Mexico also voted unanimously for his 
reappointment, and the request was granted (13). 

In the meantime Don Fausto made many inspection trips to mining 
centers, supervised the installation of pumps of his own invention, and for 
several months taught the chemistry course, because of the illness of Don 
Luis Lindner. Under his leadership the prestige of the school increased, 
and students came from distant parts of Mexico to obtain a broad cultural 
foundation as well as a practical knowledge of mining. In April, 1798, the 
King ordered that some of the most promising youths be selected by ex- 
amination to become directors and mining engineers in the viceroyships of 
Peru and Buenos Aires and the provinces of Quito, Guatemala, and Chile, 
and to establish safe, economical methods for the exploitation of the pre- 
cious metals (13). 

After Baron Alexander von Humboldt had visited Mexico in 1803, he 
wrote that “no dty of the new continent, without excepting those of the 


152 


Discovery of the Elements 


United States, presents scientific establishments so large and substantial 
as the Capitol of Mexico. I shall mention . . . the School of Mines, di- 
rected by the learned Elhuyar . . ." ( 16 ). 

The Baron also stated that 

* . . a European traveler would be surprised to meet in the interior of 
the country, near the California boundary, young Mexicans reasoning 
on the decomposition of water in the operation of amalgamation in the 
open air. The School of Mines has a chemical laboratory, a geological 
collection classified according to Werner's system, and a physical 
laboratory, in which are to be found not only valuable instruments of 
Ramsden, Adams, Lenoir, and Luis Berthoud, but also models made 
in the same capitol with the greatest precision and of the best wood in 
the country. The best mineralogical work which Spanish literature 
possesses, the manual of mineralogy arranged by Senor del Rio accord- 
ing to the principles of the Freiberg School, where the author studied, 
has been printed in Mexico ( 16 ). 

The Baron also mentioned Lavoisier's “Elements of Chemistry," the 
first Spanish edition of which was published in Mexico. Chaptal's text- 
book of chemistry was also used at the Mining Academy, but in 1820 it was 
superseded by that of Orfila ( 13 ). 

Professor Elhuyar often ordered instruments for the School of Mines 
through von Humboldt, who selected and purchased them without any 
commission. In return for this courtesy he gave the Baron much valuable 
information for his “Political Essay on New Spain" ( 13 ), ( 16 ). Von 
Humboldt later presented to European museums numerous specimens of 
Mexican minerals which this Spanish scientist had given him. 

Two of de Elhuyar's most famous papers were entitled “Suggestions on 
Coining in New Spain" and “Memoir on the Influence of Mining on the 
Agriculture, Industry, Population, and Civilization of New Spain" ( 17 ), 
( 18 ). In his “History of Mexico" ( 19 ), H. H. Bancroft extolled the former 
treatise as follows : 

With regard to the mint and coinage I find the work of Fausto de 
Elhuyar, entitled Indigaciones sobre la Amonedacidn en la Nueva Es- 
pafia, Madrid, 1818, to be extremely useful. His researches were con- 
ducted with great care, and supply a concise and correct history of the 
mint from its establishment down to the 10th of August, 1814, when 
he laid before the mining tribunal of Mexico, of which he was director, 
the results of his labors. In this book, which consists of 142 pages, he 
gives an account of the different coins struck off and the modifications 
which they experienced at different periods, also of the new system 
when the administration was assumed by the government. He more- 
over considers with attention the causes by which the interests of the 
mining industry suffered, and suggests remedies. 

During the war of independence, the once prosperous mining industry of 
Mexico passed through such a serious depression that all courses at the . 




The School of Mines in Mexico City 




154 


Discovery of the Elements 


School of Mines were suspended, with humane provision, however, for those 
of its employees who* had no other source of income. Don Fausto de 
Elhuyar relinquished his authority, and thus, after thirty-three years of 
service, his directorship came to a close on October 22, 1821. The history 
of the School of Mines (13) by the distinguished mining engineer, Santiago 
Ramirez, contains a wealth of information about Elhuyar’s services to 
Mexico. 

After returning to Madrid, Professor Elhuyar was made a member of 
the General Council of Public Credit (13), served on many government 
commissions, wrote his famous treatise on the influence of mining in New 
Spain (17), drew up the new mining law known as the Royal Decree of July 
4, 1825, and was made Director General of Mining* (20), (22). He planned 
the School of Mining Engineering of Madrid and organized and developed 
the mining industry of his native land, which he served devotedly to the 
end of his life. One of the reforms which he advocated was the eight-hour 
day (2). 

In spite of his many positions of influence and responsibility, Professor 
Elhuyar lived in modest circumstances, devoting all his energy to intellec- 
tual rather than material pursuits. He died at Madrid on January 6, 
1833, at the age of seventy-seven years. (Although the centenary of 
Elhuyar's death was observed on February 6, 1933, the death certificate 
which Senor de Gdlvez-Cafiero discovered in the records of San Sebastian 
parish in Madrid states that Don Fausto died on January 6th as the result 
of a fall (12).) 

In 1892 the Mexican government under Porfirio Diaz, the former stu- 
dents of the Mining Academy, and the leading mining companies arranged 
a mining exposition and a series of public functions throughout the year to 
commemorate the centennial anniversary of the founding of the Seminary. 
All the scientific organizations in the country participated, and the German 
musical society, the Orfedn Alemdn , gladly cooperated out of gratitude for 
the honors which the Seminary had bestowed on Baron von Humboldt. 
In each arch of the magnificent college building appeared a flag-draped 
escutcheon bearing an honored name, and foremost among these were 
Joaquin de Velazquez C&rdenas y Le6n, Fausto de Elhuyar, and Andres 
Manuel del Rio (14). 

On February 6, 1933, the Spanish Society of Physics and Chemistry, the 
Geological and Mining Institute of Spain, and the Association of Mining 
Engineers met at the School of Mining Engineering of Madrid to observe 
the one-hundredth anniversary of the death of Don Fausto de Elhuyar. 
Eloquent and scholarly addresses on the various phases of his services to 

* Although standard Spanish and German encyclopedias state that Don Fausto de 
Elhuyar also became Secretary of State, Dr. Pages (3) has pointed out that this is in- 
correct. 



Literature Cited 


155 


science were delivered by Senores Bermejo, Hauser, Galvez-Cafiero, Moles, 
Novo, and L6pez Sanchez Avecilla, and three portraits* of him were dis- 
played by Sefior de Gfilvez-Canero, who published in 1933 a beautifully illus- 
trated biography based on authentic documents and correspondence. Plans 
were announced for the publication of some of Don Fausto's papers in a 
series of Spanish scientific classics, and the Elhuyar Prize of 1000 pesetas 
was awarded to Don Fernando Gonzalez Nunez for his revision of the 
atomic weight of chromium ( 2 ). 

******* 

The writer is deeply grateful to Professor E. Moles, Mr. Galvez-Cafiero, 
Dr. F. G. Corning, Sefior Pablo Martinez del Rio, and Dr. F. B. Dains for 
the use of the illustrations accompanying this chapter. It is also a pleasure 
to acknowledge the valuable help obtained from the literature on the his- 
tory of Spanish chemistry which Dr. Moles and Mr. de Galvez-Cafiero so 
kindly contributed. 

Literature Cited 

(2) Sempere, J., “Ensayo de una biblioteca espanola de los mejores escritores del 
Reynado de Carlos III/' Imprenta Real Madrid, 1789, Vol. 5, pp. 151-77. 

(2) “El primer centenario de D. Fausto de Elhuyar/’ Anales soc. espaft.fis . quint., 31, 
115-43 (Mar. 15, 1933). 

( 3 ) Ateneo cientifico literario, y artistico de Madrid, “La Espafia del Siglo XIX,” 
Libreria de D. Antonio San Martin, Madrid, 1886, Vol. 2, pp. 412-52. Chapter 
on the history of the physical sciences by Mourelo. 

(4) Moles, E., “Wolframio, no tungsteno. Vanadio o eritronio,” Anales soc. espaU. 
fis. quint., [3], 26, 234-52 (June, 1928). 

(5) Elhuyar, J. J., and F., “Analisis quimico de volfram y examen de un nuevo metal 
que entra en su composidon,” Extractos Real Soc. Bascongada, 1783, pp. 46-88; 
Mbnoires Acad . Toulouse, 2, 141-68 (1784); English translation by Charles 
Cullen, G. Nicol, London, 1785; German translation by F. A. C. Gren, Halle, 

1786. 

(6) “Discursos leidos ante la Real Academia de Ciencias en la recepcidn piiblica del 
Ilmo, Sr. D. Juan Fages y Virgili," Madrid, 1909, 118 pp. Address on “The 
chemists of Vergara.” 

(7) Koppel, I., “Beitrag zur Entdeckungsgeschichte des Wolframs,” Chem.-Ztg ., 50, 
969-71 (Dec. 25, 1926). 

(8) Weeks, M. E., “The discovery of the elements. V. Chromium, molybdenum, 

tungsten, and uranium,” J. Chem. Educ., 9, 459-61 (Mar., 1932); ibid., Mack 
Printing Co., Easton, Pa., 1933, pp. 50-2. * 

(9) Klaproth, M. H., “Untersuchung des angeblichen Tungsteins und des Wolframs 
aus Cornwall,” CreWs Ann., 6, 507 (1786). 

(10) Mbn6ndez, M„ “La ciencia espafiola,” 3rd ed., A. Perez Dubruli, Madrid, 1888, 
Vol. 3, pp. 395-6. 

* Sefior Bermejo, president of the Spanish Society of Physics and Chemistry, also 
mentioned that there is a statue of Fausto de Elhuyar at the Faculty of Sciences of 
Saragossa. 



156 Discovery of the Elements 

(11) db GAlvez-CaAbro, A., “Apuntes biogrAficos de D. Fausto de Elhuyar y de 
Zubice,” Boletin del Institute GeolSgico y Miner o de Espafia, Vol. 53, GrAficas 
reunidas, Madrid, 1933, 253 pp. 

(12) Anuario Acad. Ciencias, Madrid, pp. 180-1 (1932); "Century-old collection 
yields new plant species,” Sci. News Letter, 24, 135 (Aug. 26, 1933). 

(13) RamIrbz, S., "Datos para la historia del Colegio de Mineria,” Government publi- 
cation for the Sociedad cientifica Antonio Alzate, Mexico City, 1890, 494 pp. 

(14) RamIrbz, S., "El centenario del Colegio de Mineria,” Sociedad cientifica Antonio 
Alzate, Memorias y revista, 6, 177-242 (1892-93). 

(15) Mourelo, J. R., "Un libro famoso,” Revista acad. ciencias (Madrid), 29, 9-52 
(Sept., 1932), Review of Barba, A. A,, "El Arte de los Metales,” 1640. 

(16) Humboldt, A., "Ensayo politico sobre Nueva Espana,” 3rd ed., Libreria de 
Lecointe, Paris, 1836, Vol. 1, pp. 232, 236-8; ibid., Vol. 2, p. 85. 

(17) Elhuyar, F., "Indigaciones sobre la amonedacion en Nueva Espana,” Imprenta 
de la calle de la Greda, Madrid, 1818, 146 pp.; “Memoria sobre el influjo de la 
mineria en la agricultura, industria, poblacibn, y civilizacibn de la Nueva Espana,” 
Imprenta de Amarita, Madrid, 1825, 154 pp. 

(18) RamIrez, S., "Noticia historica de la riqueza minera de Mexico,” Secretaria de 
Fomento, Mexico, 1884, 768 pp. 

(19) "The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft,” A. L. Bancroft and Co., San Francisco, 
1883, Vol. 11, p. 679. 

(20) Moros, F. A., “Minerales y mineralogistas espafioles,” Revista Real acad. ciencias 
(Madrid) 21,299 (1923-24). 

(21) Arnaiz y Freg, Arturo, "D. Fausto de Elhuyar y de Zubice,” Revista de His- 
toria de America (Mexico), No. 6, 75-96 (Aug., 1939). 

(22) Whitaker, A. P., "More about Fausto de Elhuyar,” ibid., No. 10, 125-30 (Dec., 
1940). 


IX. TELLURIUM AND SELENIUM 


It has been shown in preceding chapters that a number of elements includ- 
ing zinc , cobalt , nickel } manganese , hydrogen , nitrogen , oxygen , tungsten , 
molybdenum , a«d chromium were recognized and isolated during the eighteenth 
century . The story of tellurium , i/s discovery by Baron Muller von Reichen - 
stein , and i/s confirmation by Klaproth remains to be told . Although selenium 
properly belongs in the early part of the nineteenth century , it is so closely 
related to tellurium both chemically and historically that it seems best to intro- 
duce it at this point. The scientific contributions and correspondence of 
Klaproth and of Berzelius furnish detailed information about these two great 
discoveries , and the “ Early Recollections of a Chemist” by Friedrich Wohler 
present an unforgettable picture of the great Swedish master. 


“ The chymists are a strange class of mortals impelled by an 
almost insane impulse to seek their pleasure among smoke and vapour , 
soot and flame , poisons and poverty; yet among all these evils I 
seem to live so sweetly , that may I die if I would change places with 
the Persian King.” (1) 


Tellurium* 

The discoverer of tellurium, Franz Joseph Muller, was born on July 1, 
1740, in Nagyszeben (Sibiu, or Hermannstadt) in the Transylvanian Alps 
(14). After studying law and philosophy in Vienna, he attended the School 
of Mines at Schemnitz (Selmeczbdnya, or Stiavnica Banska), where he 
became intensely interested in mining, mineralogy, chemistry, and me- 
chanics. At the age of twenty-eight years he became a surveyor in Hun- 
gary, and two years later he served so efficiently on a committee which 
managed the mines and smelters in the Banat that he was appointed sur- 
veyor and director of the mines. In 1775 he went to the Tyrol as mine 
captain and acting superintendent, and under Joseph II he became chief 
inspector of all the mines, smelters, and salt-works in Transylvania (2). 

In 1782 Muller extracted from a bluish-white ore of gold (called aurum 
problematicum, aurum paradoxum , or aurum album ) , a metal which A* von 
Rupprecht thought to be antimony. Muller’s paper announcing the dis- 
covery was entitled, "An Experiment with the Regulus Thought to Be 
Metallic Antimony Occurring in the Mariahilf Min© on Mt. Fazebay near 
Salatna.”t Upon careful examination of the regulus, he decided in 1783 
that although it bore some resemblance to antimony, it must be a new 
metal, different from all others. Seeking confirmation of his discovery, 

* See also Chapter X, pp. 169-82. 

t “ V much mit dem in der Grube Mariahilf in dem Gebirge Fazebay bei Salatna 
vorkommenden vcrmeinten gediegenen Spiessglaskbnig. n 

157 



158 


Discovery of the Elements 


he sent a tiny speci- 
men to Bergman; but, 
with such a small 
sample, the latter 
could do no more than 
prove that it was not 
antimony (3), (11). 

Muller's important 
discovery seems to 
have been overlooked 
for fifteen years, but 
on January 25, 1798, 
Klaproth read a paper 
on the gold ores of 
Transylvania before 
the Academy of Sci- 
ences in Berlin. In his 
address he reminded 
his hearers of the for- 
gotten element, and 
suggested for it the 
name tellurium , mean- 
ing earth , by which 
it has ever since been 
known (<?). It is hard 
to understand why so 
many historians of 
science credit him with 
the discovery of tellu- 
rium. Klaproth, who 
was never desirous of 
undeserved honors, 
stated definitely that the element had been discovered by Miiller von 
Reichenstein in 1782 (11), (14). 

Klaproth isolated tellurium from the gold ore by the following method. 
After digesting the pulverized ore with aqua regia, he filtered off the residue 
and diluted the filtrate slightly with water. When he made the solution 
alkaline with caustic potash, a white precipitate appeared, but this dis- 
solved in excess alkali, leaving only a brown, flocculent deposit containing 
gold and hydrous ferric oxide. Klaproth removed this precipitate by 
filtration and added hydrochloric acid to the filtrate until it was exactly 
neutral. A copious precipitate appeared. After washing and drying it 
he stirred it up with oil and introduced the oil paste into a glass retort; 





From " Jac . Berzelius, Selbslbiographische Aufzeichnungen 
Kahlbaum Monographs, Heft 7 

Youthful Portrait of Berzelius 
Left an orphan early in life, he was educated by his 
stepfather. Berzelius studied at the Linkbping Gym- 
nasium and later at the University of Upsala, where he 
received the degree of Doctor of Medicine. He was a 
student of Ekeberg, the discoverer of tantalum. 



J6ns Jakob Berzelius 159 

which he gradually heated to redness. When he cooled the apparatus, he 
found metallic globules of tellurium in the receiver and retort (3), (11), 

The discovery of tellurium was by no means the only service that Muller 
von Reichenstein performed for the glory of his country. Kaiser Joseph 
appointed him acting governor (Gubernialrath) and raised him to the 
hereditary nobility with the title of Freiherr (Baron) von Reichenstein. 
For sixteen years he was a 
courtier in Vienna, but in 
1818 he asked permission to 
retire. Although he was 
exempted from making re- 
ports, he was still asked to 
attend all the council meet- 
ings, in order that the state 
might continue to receive 
his valued advice on mining 
and metallurgy. The cross 
of the Order of St. Stephen 
was awarded to him for dis- 
tinguished services to his 
country and he was also 
elected to membership in 
the Mining Society, the 
Gesellschaft naturforschender 
Freunde (Society of Scien- 
tific Friends) at Berlin, and 
in the Mineralogical Society 
at Jena (2), After serving 
his country for sixty-two 
years and publishing many 
contributions to chemistry 
and mineralogy, Muller von 
Reichenstein died in Vienna 
at the venerable age of 
eighty-five years (4). 

According to Paul Dier- 
gart, Paul Kitaibel, professor of botany and chemistry at the University 
of Pest, discovered tellurium independently in 1789 and wrote a paper on 
it (5), (14), (15). 

Selenium 

The discoverer of selenium was no other than the illustrious Swedish 
chemist, Jdns Jacob Berzelius, who was bom in W&fversunda, a village in 



Courtesy Dr. L. von Szathmdry 


Paul Kitaibel 
1757-1817 

Hungarian chemist and botanist who anticipated 
Klaproth in his researches on tellurium. The 
original discoverer of this element, however, was 
Muller von Reichenstein. 



160 


Discovery of the Elements 


Ostergotland, on August 20, 1779. His childhood was saddened by the 
early death of his parents, but his stepfather provided carefully for his 
education. After attending the school at Linkoping, Berzelius studied 
medicine at Upsala, and at the age of twenty-two years he received his 
medical degree. Afzelius, a nephew of Bergman, was then the professor of 
chemistry, and Ekeberg, who discovered tantalum at about the time of 

Berzelius’ graduation, was 
an assistant. 

In the following year 
Berzelius was appointed 
assistant professor of medi- 
cine, botany, and pharmacy 
at the celebrated medical 
school of Stockholm which 
he served with honor and dis- 
tinction for the rest of his 
life. During part of the 
time he also lectured at the 
Military College and at the 
Medico-Surgical Institute 
at Stockholm. Berzelius, 
unlike other chemistry pro- 
fessors of his time, enlivened 
his lectures with many 
striking demonstrations. 
His fame as a teacher soon spread throughout Europe, with the result that 
brilliant ambitious students of chemistry made Stockholm their Mecca. 
Mitscherlich, Wohler, C. G. Gmelin, Mosander, Svanberg, Sefstrom, and 
the Rose brothers, Heinrich and Gustav, all received their inspiration 
from the great Swedish master. 

A vivid picture of Berzelius and an understanding of his sympathetic 
attitude toward his students may be obtained by reading the “ Early 
Recollections of a Chemist,” by Friedrich Wohler: 

With a throbbing heart (says Wohler) I stood before Berzelius’s 
door and rang the bell. A well-dressed, dignified gentleman with 
florid and healthy complexion let me in. It was Berzelius himself. 
He welcomed me very cordially, informed me that he had been ex- 
pecting me for some time, and wished me to tell him of my journey — 
all this in the German language, with which he was as familiar as 
with French and English. This first day he took me to the Caroline 
Institute, where he gave his lectures to medical students, but which 
were also attended by officers of the army and several of his friends, 
and which I regularly visited afterwards to accustom my ear to the 
language. This afforded me opportunity to admire his calm and ♦ 



Second-Floor Plan of Berzelius’ I*aboratory 
and Dwelling House 


1 — Kitchen — Laboratory 

2 — Laboratory 

3 — Bedroom 

4 — Parlor 

5 — Not used by Berzelius 



Selenium 


161 


clear delivery and his skill in performing experiments. In this 
institute was also the laboratory for medical students, which was 
presided over by Mosander (6‘). 


Berzelius determined the 
atomic weights of nearly all the 
elements then known, and was 
the first chemist to determine 
them accurately. He referred 
his atomic weights to oxygen, 
which, however, he allowed to 
equal 100, instead of 16 as in our 
present system. In his little 
laboratory that looked like a 
kitchen and in which the sand- 
bath on the stove was never al- 
lowed to cool, Berzelius dis- 
covered the important elements: 
selenium, silicon, thorium, ce- 
rium, and zirconium^ 

About a hundred miles north- 
west of Stockholm there lies 
among barren hills the famous 
old mining-town of Fahlun. The 
average tourist might not be 
greatly interested in the smoky 
old town with its grimy, little 
wooden houses, its sickly vege- 
tation, and its odor of sulfuric 
acid fumes, but the chemist 



A pencil sketch by Magnus ’ brother, 
Eduard. From Hofmann's " Zur Erin- 
nerung an vorangegangene Freunde" 

Gustav Magnus, 1802-1870 

German chemist and physicist. One of 
Berzelius' distinguished students. He was 
one of the first chemists to investigate tellu- 
rium. He contributed to mineralogical chem- 
ical analysis, physiological and agricultural 
chemistry and chemical technology, and de- 
vised a simple process for recovering selenium 
from the slime in the lead chambers of sulfuric 
acid plants. He also carried out important 
researches in mechanics, hydrodynamics, 
heat, optics, electricity, and magnetism. 


would recall its important r61e in 

the early history of selenium. Berzelius and Assessor Gahn owned shares 
in a sulfuric acid plant at Gripsholm that used as raw material pyrite 
from the mine at Fahlun. On September 23, 1817 (7), Berzelius wrote 
to his friend, Dr. Mareet of London, that he and Gahn had found tellurium 


in the sulfuric acid, but on February 6th of the following year he wrote 
again to Dr. Mareet, telling him that they had been mistaken about the 
tellurium (£) : 


I have just examined it more carefully here at Stockholm (wrote 
Berzelius) and have found that what Mr. Gahn and I took for tellu- 
rium is a new substance, endowed with interesting properties. This 
substance has the properties of a metal, combined With that of sulfur 
to such a degree that one would say it is a new kind of sulfur. Here 
are some of its properties If one sublimes it in a large vessel, 


162 


Discovery of the Elements 


it is deposited in the form of flowers of a cinnabar red, which are 
nevertheless not oxidized. During its cooling it keeps for some 
time a certain degree of fluidity, such that one can shape it between 
the fingers and draw it into threads .... When one heats this new 
substance with a flame, it burns with an azure blue flame, and gives 
a very strong odor of radishes; it was this odor that made us think 
it was tellurium. 

The similarity to tellurium has given me occasion to name the 
new substance selenium .... In the hope of pleasing you and Mr. 
Wollaston, I am enclosing a little thread of selenium, which will 
surely be broken before arriving, but some of it will always remain. 
The paper in which it is wrapped has been colored by a sublimation 
of selenium which took place when, in my absence, the fire was 
stirred up too much in order to evaporate a solution of ammonium 
selenate (£). 



Balances Used by Berzelius 


The following long quotation from Berzelius not only gives the details of 
this remarkable discovery, but also serves as a splendid example of his 
vividly dear literary style: 

They use at Fahlun (he said) for the manufacture of sulfur, pyrites 
occurring at various places in the copper mine. The pyrites are 
often mixed with galena, blende, and several foreign substances. 
The pyrites are placed on a layer of dry wood, in long, horizontal 
furnaces, the upper part of which is covered with earth and de- 
composed pyrites; the fumes pass from these furnaces into hori- 






Selenium 


163 


fcontal tuyeres, the fore part of which is of brick and the rest of wood. 
The wood is lighted below, and the heat causes the excess sulfur to 
distil from the lower layer of the pyrite; the gaseous sulfur is carried 
by the current of warm air, and is finally deposited as flowers in 
the tuyeres. ... 

When this distilled sulfur is used for manufacturing sulfuric acid 
by burning it, a red, pulverulent mass is deposited at the bottom of 
the lead chamber. This fact was observed long ago by Mr. Bjuggren, 
who then owned a sulfuric acid plant at Gripsholm. He found that 
this does not occur when another kind of sulfur is used; and as he 
had learned from a chemist that the red material must contain ar- 
senic, he no longer used sulfur from Fahlun. 



From Guinchard’s “Sweden," Vol. 2 


The Fahlun Mine Is the Oldest Copper Mine in Sweden 

It was worked in the 13th century, and has been run almost continually ever since. 
Its present output of copper is small, but iron pyrite is still produced. The pyrite from 
this mine was the first source of selenium. Gahn, the discoverer of manganese, and 
Sefstrom, the discoverer of vanadium, lived in Fahlun. 


Since this plant has been purchased by Gahn, Eggertz and myself 
(continued Berzelius), the Fahlun sulfur has been burned there con- 
tinually. The red sediment which forms in the acid liquid always 
remained at the bottom of the chamber, and consequently increased 
in thickness to the depth of a millimeter. The operation by which 
the sulfur is acidified in this plant differs from that usually employed 
in that the sulfur is not mixed with potassium nitrate. Flat glass 
vessels containing nitric acid are placed on the bottom of the tank 
and the sulfurous acid gas, in decomposing the nitric acid, produces 
the nitrous gas necessary for the complete acidification of the sulfur. . . . 




164 


Discovery of the Elements 


Berzelius then explained how he and Assessor Gahn had been misled into 
thinking that they had found tellurium in the sulfuric acid : 


In the glass vessels containing the nitric acid (said he) there is 
found, after the complete decomposition of the nitric acid, a concen- 

trated sulfuric acid at the bottom 



of which is deposited a red, or 
sometimes brown, powder. This 
powder aroused our attention and 
led us to make a special examina- 
tion of it. The quantity resulting 
from the combustion of 250 kilos 
of sulfur did not exceed 3 grams. 
The principal mass was sulfur; it 
could be lighted and burned like 
this substance; but it left a copi- 
ous ash which, when heated with a 
blowpipe, gave a strong odor of de- 
cayed radishes or cabbage, analo- 
gous to that which Klaproth says 
is produced when one treats tellu- 
rium in the same manner. . 

The appearance of a substance 
as rare as tellurium in the Fahlun 
sulfur led me to try to isolate it, 
in order to obtain more exact and 


Alexander Marcet 
1770-1822 

Swiss physician and chemist. Lec- 
turer on chemistry at Guy’s Hospital, 
London. Friend of Berzelius, Wollas- 
ton, and Tennant. He carried out a 
number of researches in physiological 
chemistry. In collaboration with Ber- 
zelius he studied the properties of 
carbon bisulfide. 

at a moderate temperature. It 


certain ideas regarding it. I there- 
fore had the whole mass at the 
bottom of the lead chamber re- 
moved. While still wet it had a 
reddish color, which, upon desic- 
cation, became almost yellow. It 
weighed about four pounds. It 
was treated with aqua regia added 
in sufficient quantity to render the 
mass pulpy, and was finally digested 
gradually changed color, the red 


disappeared, and the mass became greenish yellow. After 48 hours 
of digestion, water and sulfuric acid were added, and it was filtered. 


The filtrate had a deep yellow color. The mass remaining on the 
filter had not visibly diminished in volume; it consisted principally 


of sulfur mixed with lead sulfate and other impurities. 


The final steps in the isolation of the new element were described by 
Berzelius as follows: 


A small quantity of filtrate (said he) was taken to study the method 
of separating the substance supposed to be present; it was pre- 
cipitated with ammonium hydroxide. The precipitate, well washed 
and dried, mixed with potassium and heated at the end of a barometer 
tube, decomposed with ignition. Placed in water, a part dissolved, 
and the liquid acquired the orange color of strong beer, very different 



Selenium 


165 


from the red wine color given by the hydro telluride of potassium. 
The liquid did not cover the silvery pellet which always rises to the 
surface of the hydrotelluride of potassium ; but after a few hours, it 
became turbid and deposited red flakes, the quantity of which was 
increased by the addition of nitric acid. The precipitate was pre- 
served, and when a part of the filter on which the red precipitate had 
been collected was lighted at a candle flame, it gave the edges of the 
flame an azure blue color, meanwhile exhaling a strong odor of putrid 
cabbage. A portion of very pure tellurium, precipitated in the 
same manner from a solution of the hydrotelluride of potassium, had a 
gray color, gave a greenish color to the edge of the flame, and pro- 
duced no perceptible radish odor. . . . 

Berzelius then proved that the odor of impure tellurium is caused by the 
presence in it of small amounts of the new substance : 

Upon examining more carefully the purified tellurium which 
served for my earlier experiments with the oxide of tellurium and 
hydrogen telluride gas (said he) I found that it produced no odor, 
either when one heated it with the blowpipe or upon reduction to the 
oxide, and that the only way to make it produce such an odor was 
to heat it in a glass tube closed with the finger, until the vaporized 
metal escaped tlirough a hole in the softened glass. It then burned 
in this hole with a blue flame, giving an odor entirely analogous to 
that of the red substance. . . . These experiments seemed to me to 
prove that the red substance could not be tellurium, but that tellu- 
rium itself contains varying amounts of it according to the care with 
which it has been purified. . . . 

Berzelius continued his experiments and soon realized that he was 
dealing with a new element : 

The brown material, insoluble in water, examined more carefully 
(said he), was recognized to be the cause of the peculiar odor we 
mentioned above ; and by means of some experiments which we shall 
report soon, it was found that it was a combustible, elementary sub- 
stance hitherto unknown, to which I have given the name selenium, 
derived from Selene (the moon), to recall its analogy with tellurium. 
According to its chemical properties, this substance belongs between 
sulfur and tellurium, although it has more properties in common 
with sulfur than with tellurium (9), (17). 

Since Klaproth had named tellurium for the earth, Berzelius thought it 
appropriate to name the sister element for the earth's satellite. The 
results of his investigation of selenium and its compounds were published 
in 1818 in the Annales de Chimie et de Physique . 

His “Lehrbuch der Chemie ” was translated into German by Wohler and 
was later translated into several other languages. Berzelius also published 
each year, beginning in 1821, a report on progress in physics and chemistry 
called the “Jahresbericht iiber die Fortschritte in der Physik und Chemie ” 



Reproduced by kind permission of The Edgar F. Smith Memorial Collection in the History of Chemistry 

University of Pennsylvania 

Berzelius Autograph Letter 
Translation of Letter, Part of Which Is Reproduced Above 

Letter of Introduction written by Berzelius for Mr. Engelke to Herr E. L. Schubarth 
Ph.D., M.D., Professor Extraordinary of Chemistry at the University of Berlin and 
Teacher of Chemistry at the Technical Institute in Berlin. 

Dear Sir: Stockholm, Apr. 14, 1815. 

I herewith take the liberty to commend to you heartily Mr. Engelke, the bearer of 
this letter. Mr. Engelke is, to be sure, really neither a scientist nor a technologist; he 
is employed, however, in our local Commercial College, where, because of exceptional 
general knowledge and great eagerness to fulfil his duties properly, he will in time take a 
higher place. The object of his present journey is to study the various industries in 
foreign countries from the point of view of political economy, and indeed I could recom- 
mend him to no other than yourself with greater hope that he would receive sound 
guidance in these things. I should therefore deem it a great favor if you would have the 
kindness to receive my friend Engelke so that he may have an opportunity to see and 
learn the things corresponding to file purpose of his journey. 

I beg you to give my best regards to [name illegible] and, if there is an opportunity, 
to introduce Mr. Engelke to him. 

With most profound respect, I have the honor to remain. Sir, 

Your humble servant, Jac. Berzelius 




167 


J6ns Jacob Berzelius 

His students and friends adored him. Although Friedrich Wohler spent 
only a few months in Stockholm, his contact with the great master in- 
fluenced the whole course of his life. Their frequent exchange of intimate 
letters lasted many years, to be interrupted at last only by the death of 
Berzelius. Berzelius’ correspondence with Dr. Marcet, Davy, Wollaston, 
and others was also extensive. 


He did not marry until late in life. 
“Yes, my dear Wohler, I have now 
been a benedict for six weeks. I have 
learned to know a side of life of which 
I formerly had a false conception or 
none at all” (10). The bride was 
more than thirty years younger than 
Berzelius, but their married life 
proved to be most happy. On the 
wedding day King Charles Jean of 
vSweden honored him in a gracious and 
appropriate manner. As Berzelius 
entered his bride’s home just before 
the ceremony, his father-in-law 
handed him a letter, saying that the 
King wished to have it read aloud to 
the guests. The letter, which was 
written in French, announced that 
Berzelius, because of his eminent 
services to Sweden, was to be given 
the dignity and title of Baron (10), 
( 16 ). 

Selenium is now used instead of 
manganese for decolorizing glass, and 
its principal uses are in the glass and 
ceramics industry. The metallic form 
of the element is a non-conductor of 
electricity in the dark, but has a con- 
ductivity proportional to the intensity 
of the light falling on it. This pecu- 


On January 29, 1836, he wrote, 



Jons Jacob Berzelius 
1779-1848 

Professor of chemistry and medi- 
cine at the Stockholm Medical School. 
He determined the atomic weights of 
most of the elements then known, and 
discovered selenium and the earth 
ceria, and isolated silicon, thorium, and 
zirconium. Among his students may 
be mentioned Wohler, Heinrich and 
Gustav Rose, Mosander, Sefstrdm, and 
Arfwedson. 


liar behavior made possible the construction of the very sensitive photo- 
electric selenium cell. The first photophone using such a cell for 
transmitting speech by means of a beam of light was devised by Alexander 
Graham Bell in 1880. Although modern sound films are made with 
photoelectric cells of the alkali metal type, the early development of talking 
pictures, phototelegraphy, and television owed much to the element that 
Berzelius discovered in the slime of his sulfuric acid plant (12), (13), 


168 Discovery of the Elements 

Literature Cited 

(/) Bechbr, J. J., “Acta Laboratorii Chymica Monacensis, seu Physica Subterranea,” 
1669; H. E. Howe, “Chemistry in Industry,” 3rd edition, Vol. 1, The Chemical 
Foundation, Inc., New York, 1926, frontispiece. 

(2) von Wurzbach, C., “Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich,” 
60 vols., Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, Vienna, 1891. Article on Miiller, Freiherr 
von Reichenstein, Franz Joseph. 

(.9) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” Vol. 1, Baudry ct Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
500-4. 

(4) Poggendorfp, J. C., “Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichtc 
der exakten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Article on Muller von Reichenstein, Franz Joseph. 

(5) Diergart, P., “Tellur und Brom in der Zeit ihrer Entdeekung,” Z. angew. Chew., 
33, 299-300 (Nov., 1920). 

(6) WOhler, F., “Early recollections of a chemist,” translated into English by 
Laura R. Joy. Am. Chemist, 6, 131-6 (Oct., 1875); “Jugend-Erinnerungen eines 
Chemikers,” Ber., 8, 838-52 (1875). 

(7) SOderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref,” Vol. 1, part 3, Almqvist and Wiksetls, 
Upsala, 1912-1914, pp. 157-8. 

(S) Ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, p. 161. 

(fl) Berzelius, J. J., “Recherches sur un nouveau corps mineral trouv£ dans le soufre 
fabriqu6 k Fahlun,” Ann. chim. phys., 9, 160-6 (1818). 

( tO) Wallach, O., “Briefwechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler,” Vol. 1, Verlag 
von Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig, 1901, pp. 642-3. 

( 11 ) Klaproth, M. H., “Extrait d'un Memoire de Klaproth sur un nouveau metal 
nomm£ Tellurium, 4 ” Ann. chim. phys., 25, 273-81, 327-31 (1798); “Abstract of a 
memoir of Klaproth on a new metal denominated tellurium,” Nicholson's J., 
2, 372-6 (Nov., 1798). 

(12) Rankinb, “Telephoning by light,” Nature, 104, 604-6 (Feb. 5, 1920). 

(12) Friend, J. N., “A Textbook of Inorganic Chemistry,” Vol. 2, part 2, Chas. Griffin 
and Co., London, 1931, pp. 297-8 and 301-2. 

( 14 ) von SzathmAry, L., “Paul Kitaibel, the Hungarian Chemist,” Magyar Gydgys- 
zerhztud. Tdrsasdg Urtesitoje, No. 4, 1-35 (1931); “Concerning the polemics 
which led to the discovery of tellurium,” ibid., No. 1, 1-11 (1932). In Hungarian ; 
summaries in German. 

(15) Weeks, M. E., “The discovery of tellurium,” J. Chem. Educ., 12, 403-9 (Sept., 
1935). 

(16) S6dbrbaum, H. G., “Jdns Jacob Berzelius, Autobiographical Notes,” Williams 
and Wilkins Co., Baltimore, 1934, 194 pp. English translation by Olof Larsell. 

( 17 ) Berzelius, J. J., “Undersokning af en ny mineralkropp funnen i de orenare 
sorterna af det vid Fahlun tillverkade svaflet,” Afh. i. Fysik, Kemi och Mineralogi , 
6, 42-144 (1818), 



X. THE KLAPROTH-KITAIBEL CORRESPONDENCE ON 
THE DISCOVERY OF TELLURIUM 


Some letters of Klaproth and Kitaibel which have been carefully preserved 
in the Hungarian National Museum at Budapest for more than a century shed 
new light on the early history of the element tellurium and reveal the characters 
of Baron Franz Joseph Muller von Reichenstein, who discovered it in the gold 
ores of Transylvania , of Paul Kitaibel , who rediscovered it, and of Martin 
Heinrich Klaproth, who named it and made it known to the scientific world. 
Since Professor Ladislaus von Smthmary' s excellent articles (1) on this sub- 
ject are in the Hungarian language and not readily accessible to most chemists, 
an English translation of the Klaproth-Kitaibel correspondence is presented 
here. The original letters of both are in German . 


The gold mines of Nagyag were discovered by accident. A Roumanian 
peasant, Juon Armenian (oi Armindjan), who used to pasture his pig in the 
Nagy&g forest, reported to Baron Ignaz von Born's father that he had seen 
flames breaking through a crevice, which had led him to believe that there 
must be a rich deposit of metal there. After years of searching, Bom 
found a black, leafy ore which he at first mistook for pyrite but which 
proved to be rich in gold. He and his partner, Wildburg, opened the shaft 
on April 8, 1747, and named it the “Conception of Maria"; the Roumani- 
ans, however, called it the “Gypsy Shaft," for a Gypsy who lived nearby 
used to repair the miners’ tools. Although the Born family had no 
difficulty in extracting the gold, they were unable to determine the composi- 
tion of the ore, which, because of its rarity, was highly prized by collectors. 
This ore was found also at Zalatna and Offenbanya, and later in the Borz- 
sony Mountains (I). 

In the latter part of the eighteenth century, a skilful Hungarian chemist, 
Colonel Joseph Ramacsahazy, examined the gold ores of the Borzsony Moun- 
tains and was hampered in his analyses by the presence of a troublesome 
unknown substance. In describing this ore he used the alchemistic term 
“unripe gold," and on January 30, 1781, he made a contract with another 
chemist, Matthew Bohm, to “ripen" it. Bohm deceived him, however, and 
was deported from Hungary. (This information was generously contrib- 
uted by Professor von Szathm&ry , who obtained it from the Record Office in 
Budapest.) 

At the Maria Loretto shaft near Zalatna in the Facebaj Mountains 
(lower Fej4r County), another white, leafy gold ore known as Spiessglaskdnig 
or argent molybdique presented similar difficulties. When Professor Anton 
von Rupprecht of Selmeczb4nya (Schemnitz) roasted the mineral gently on 
charcoal, he found that the metallic residue, when treated with mercury, 

169 



170 


Discovery of the Elements 


gave no trace of vermilion (red mercuric sulfide). Since the mineral had a 
metallic luster, gave no test for sulfur, and behaved in many respects like 
antimony, von Rupprecht concluded that it must be native antimony. 

This view, however, was opposed by a distinguished contemporary. 
Baron Franz Joseph Muller von Reichenstein was born at Nagyszeben 
(Sibiu, or Hermannstadt) in the Transylvanian Alps on July 1, 1740.* 
After receiving his elementary education in his native city, he went to 
Vienna to study philosophy and law. Later he became so deeply interested 
in mining, metallurgy, and chemistry that in 1763 he entered the famous 
School of Mines of Selmeczbanya, or Schemnitz (which is now known as 



Tellurium Medallion 

A very rare tellurium medallion bearing on one side the in- 
scription “Tellurium from Nagyag, 1896” and on the other 
the words “Royal Hungarian smelter at Selmeczbanya [Schem- 
nitz]. ” The diameter is 43 mm., the thickness 5.5 mm. One 
of these medallions is owned by the Hungarian National 
Museum, another by the University of Sopron [Odenburg]. 

Stiavnica Banska, Czechoslovakia). Here he studied under the capable 
leadership of N. J. Jacquin (I). 

Upon returning to Transylvania, he served on a mining commission to 
reorganize the neglected mines of his native country, and later became di- 
rector of mines in the Banat. When he succeeded in putting the mines on 
a paying basis, Maria Theresia entrusted him with similar responsibilities 
in the Tyrol. In 1775, although successfully established as a mining 
* This statement may serve as a correction to page 65 of the first and second editions of 
"The Discovery of the Elements." Dr. Speter and Professor von Szathm&ry kindly 
informed me that Baron von Reichenstein was born in Nagyszeben, not in Vienna, and 
that heat first mistook die tellurium not for antimony but for bismuth. 




Discovery of Tellurium 


171 


official in the little Tyrolian town of Schwatz, 
he preferred to return to his own country. 
King Joseph II gratified this desire by sending 
him to Transylvania on special commissions, 
and in 1778 appointed him as provincial 
commissioner. 

During his travels Muller amassed a splen- 
did mineral collection, which he arranged ac- 
cording to Born’s system. When he set to 
work in his poorly equipped laboratory at 
Nagyszeben to examine the ore which von 
Rupprecht believed to be native antimony, 
he made slow progress. On September 21, 
1782, however, he published a statement (2) 
to the effect that the mineral in question was 
not native antimony, but bismuth sulfide. 
When the ore was melted with niter and 
tartaric acid, it did not yield antimony. It 
colored the flame blue and formed an amal- 



Courtesy Prof. L. von Ssathmdry 

Selenium Medallion 
A selenium medallion bear- 
ing a portrait of Berzelius. 
The diameter is about 45 mm. 
This medallion was cast at 
the Selmeczb&nya smelter and 
is now in possession of the 
University of Sopron. It is 
extremely rare and has un- 
fortunately been broken. 


gam with mercury, whereas antimony would 
have failed to give these reactions. 

In the following year, however, he concluded that the mineral contained 
neither bismuth sulfide nor antimony, that the gold was an essential constit- 
uent of it, and that it contained an unknown metal. In an investigation 
lasting three years and consisting of more than fifty tests, he determined the 
specific gravity of the mineral and noted the radish odor of the white smoke 
which passed off when the new metal was heated, the red color which the 
metal imparts to sulfuric acid, and the black precipitate which this solution 
gives when diluted with water (5) . 

Muller also sent a very small specimen of the new substance to Torbern 
Bergman, who regularly corresponded with him and whom he considered 
to be “the greatest chemist of the present century.” In the reply dated 
April 13, 1784, Bergman confirmed Muller’s results, mentioned Elhuyar's 
recent discovery of tungsten, commented on the surprising increase in the 
number of known metals, and added, “I am waiting impatiently for your 
parcel so that I may work with larger amounts.” . Unfortunately, Bergman 
was never able to work with this larger specimen; for he died in July of the 
same year. Twelve years later, Muller, desirous of still further verifica- 
tion, sent a specimen to Martin Heinrich Klaproth, the leading analytical 
chemist of Germany, who analyzed it and completely confirmed the dis- 
covery of the new metal (4). In his report before the Academy of Sciences 
in Berlin on January 25, 1798, Klaproth named the metal tellurium and 
mentioned that the’ original discoverer of it was Muller von Reichenstein, 



172 


Discovery of the Elements 


V ■» - U 

,r r %-e ^ <**■ , 

,**. > \ ' J .Xtr ■< 





% 
f 


te ' * V* , 

i ' , S'* 

*•■ , > »*•-'** 


When Mliller was 
promoted to the of- 
fice of aulic councilor 
he regretfully left 
Transylvania for 
Vienna. He was 

later pensioned with 
the order of St. 
Stephen. He died 

in Vienna on October 
12, 1825 (or 1826?). 
Although Baron von 
Reichenstein’s wife, 
Margaretha von 
Hochengarten, was 
German, and al- 

though he spent 
much of his life 

among German 
people and received 
many honors from 
the Austrians, his 
descendants still live 
in his native land of 
Transylvania. 

In 1789 the famous 
Hungarian scientist, 
Paul Kitaibel, dis- 
covered tellurium in- 
dependently. He 
was born on Feb- 
From Siathm&ry, " Magyar Alkimist&k " Hiary 3, 1757, at 

Icnaz Edler VON Born Nagy-MSrton [Mat- 

Distinguished Transylvanian metallurgist, mineralogist, tersdorf ], and at- 
and mining engineer. Kitaibel found tellurium in a mineral tended the academy 
mdybd^te° m ^ inCOrreCtly dCSignated as argentiferous at Raab j n Qrder tQ 

prepare himself for 

the University of Buda. After serving under Professor J. Winterl as adjunct 
in chemistry and botany (5), (£), he received his medical degree in 1785. 

Four years later young Dr. Kitaibel found a new element in an ore from 
Deutsch-Pilsen which Baron von Bom* had regarded as argentiferous 

* Ignaz Edler von Bom (1742-1791). Transylvanian metallurgist. Inventor of a 
famous amalgamation process of recovering gold and silver. 




~ * * — ” — ■■ ? | [ * 




.«! . . *!>.l ift-. *, A* .•> r* .. 

> > ''p ip 


Kxtaibel on the Discovery of Tellurium 


173 


molybdenite. At the suggestion of Abb€ Estner* and Mine Captain 
Haidinger,f he also investigated the aurum problematicum and found that 
it contained the same new element as that in the molybdic silver. When 
he sent an account of his researches to Klaproth for criticism, the latter 
gave a most favorable written report, but evidently gave no further thought 
to the matter. Muller von Reichenstein later presented Klaproth with his 
supply of aurum problematicum , and Klaproth reported the existence of the 
new metal, tellurium, giving full credit to the original discoverer , Muller von 
Reichenstein , but failed to mention Kitaibel’s work on the “molybdic 
silver/' Since Kitaibel was unaware of the researches of Miiller von 
Reichenstein and had been led to the erroneous conclusion that Klaproth 
had claimed the discovery, he defended his priority over the latter in the 
following letter to Johann Georg Lenz, professor of mineralogy at Jena (7) : 

March, 1800. 

I received yesterday the diploma which the Mineralogical Society at 
Jena intended for me and which you were so kind as to send me. I 
hasten to give you my heartiest thanks and to ask you to express my 
gratitude to the famous Society for this honor and to assure it that I 
shall strive to the best of my ability to live up to your mutual aims. 
At present, to be sure, I am so occupied with the duties of my office, 
traveling, and botanical work that I scarcely have time to think of 
other activities, and my field is not so much mineralogy as botany and 
chemistry; however, since I hope to find much worthy of notice on 
my trips now about to be taken at public expense, and since the chemi- 
cal analysis of mineral products not yet sufficiently well known will 
be no less welcome to the Society than the external characteristics of 
the same, I yet hope, when time permits, to accomplish some things 
suited to your aims. 

On this occasion I learned that the news has been brought to Jena 
that I had discovered tellurium before Klaproth and that this famous 
chemist had appropriated my discovery to himself. The whole matter 
stands as follows; 

About twelve years ago, the professor of natural history, Piller, J 
who died here, gave me a little piece of ore from Deutsch-Pilsen in the 
Hont region, saying that it was argentiferous molybdenite and that I 
might determine the silver content. In some experiments that I made 
with it, I found, to be sure, that it did contain silver (<?), but it was 
evident also that the remainder was certainly not molybdenite, but a 
new metal. After some time, I found the same mineral listed in 
Bora's Catalogue as molybdic silver. 

When Abbd Estner came here to appraise the collection of natural 
history specimens left by Piller, and I learned that this very expert 
mineralogist was working on a Mineralogy , I told him what I had found 

* Abb6 Franz Joseph Anton Estner (1739-1803). Mineralogist at Vienna, 
t Karl Haidinger (1756-1797). Austrian mineralogist and mining engineer. Father 
of the famous mineralogist, Wilhelm Karl von Haidinger. 

t Mathias Piller (1733-1788), professor of natural history at Buda. 



174 


Discovery of the Elements 


out experimentally about the so-called molybdic silver and what I be- 
lieve it to be. At his request, I repeated my previous experiments with 
the few fragments of this mineral which I still had, compiled [the re- 
sults], and sent them to him in Vienna. The sagacious mineralogist 
and Mine Captain Haidinger, who had an opportunity to read my 
article, wrote me after a time that they believed that the Transylva- 
nian gold ores ( aurum graphicum , aurum problematicum ) contain the 
same metal which I had found in Bom’s molybdic silver; I wished to 
investigate the matter more thoroughly and found indeed that the 
metal which was combined with the gold in the ore possessed all the 
properties found for that in the ore from Pilsen, which I immediately 
reported to Abb6 Estner. 



Courtesy Dr. F. Fiala 

The Former School of Mining and Forestry at SCHEM- 
NITZ, OR SELMECZBANYA 


Schemnitz, or Stiavnica Banska, Czechoslovakia, where 
Muller von Reickenstein, the discoverer of tellurium, was 
educated. When Austria-Hungary was divided in 1918, the 
collections, the library, the archives, and most of the portable 
equipment at the former Schemnitz School of Mines were 
taken to the University of Sopron in Hungary. Transylvania, 
with its historic mines of gold and tellurium, became part of 
Roumania. 


Some time after this, Klaproth’s analysis of the molybdic silver ap- 
peared. To my no slight surprise, I found there the statement that 
this contains bismuth. Mr. Klaproth then came to Vienna, and Abb6 
Estner gave him my paper to read, which was returned to me with a 
very favorable utterance regarding my chemical work. After this, 
Mr. Klaproth announced his discovery of tellurium. From this it can 
certainly be surmised with some foundation that this famous chemist 
was led to this discovery through my work, yet it cannot be proved; 
and even if the documents which I possess were sufficient for this, yet I 
would not do it. Mr. Klaproth, with whomT had the honor to become 
personally acquainted in Berlin a year and a half ago, is my friend, 
who, it is to be hoped, will himself, when he announces his cbrrected 
analysis of the molybdic silver, state to the public that I discovered the 
aforementioned new metal in this mineral before he did. If he does 



175 


Klaproth on the Discovery of Tellurium 

not do this, Abbe Estner will do it when he comes to this subject in the 
edition of his Mineralogy. Then one may judge from Klaproth’s be- 
havior as one will ; as long as I shall not have been the cause of it, it 
will not trouble me. But until then I must ask that no public use of 
information on this matter, either from my family or from friends, 
shall be made; the circumstances of my office demand this. 

I cherish the hope that some time I may merit your highly desired 
friendship, and remain, Sir, your most respectful and obedient servant, 

K[itaibel]. 

The following is a translation of the “very favorable utterance” of 
Klaproth to which Kitaibel referred in the preceding letter: 



Courtesy Dr. F. Fiala 

"BelhAzy” 


The building at Stiavnica Bafiska, Czechoslovakia, which 
in the eighteenth century housed the chemical and mineral- 
ogical laboratories of the former Schemnitz School of Mines. 
Muller von Reichenstein, the discoverer of tellurium, and 
A. M. del Rio, the discoverer of vanadium, both attended 
this school. 


Vienna, Aug. 1, 1796. 

I have read both of the present chemical articles which Abb£ Estner 
kindly communicated to me with so much the greater pleasure because 
these give praiseworthy evidence that the author of them is a thor- 
oughly practical chemist. The first of these, concerning molybdic sil- 
ver, is not, to be sure, in entire agreement with my results; but this is 
easily explained, for my results for these constituents refer only to the 
individual specimen which I analyzed. . . 

Klaproth. 

[The portion of the report here omitted refers to Kitaibel's paper on 
hydroferrocyanic acid and Prussian blue. ] 

One day as Klaproth was reading Wieland's New German Mercury, he 
ran across the following disconcerting statement ( 9 ) : 




176 


Discovery of the Elements 


The discovery of the new metal tellurium, which has already, in the 
first volume of the Zeitschrift fur Ungarn , been claimed by Professor 
von Schedius* for our energetic fellow-countryman Kitaibel (adjunct 
at the Hungarian University at Pest) will also soon be claimed for Mr. 
Kitaibel in the second volume of the Annalen der Jenaischen Gesell- 
schaft fur die gesammte Mineralogie. Mr. Klaproth in Berlin, who has 
hitherto been regarded in Germany as the discoverer, was merely led 
by some of Kitaibel’s articles which he read on a visit to Vienna to the 
further investigation of the new metal, which he named tellurium. 
Suum cuique! 

As a result of this unjust accusation, Klaproth wrote to Kitaibel as 
follows : 

Berlin Sept. 2, 1803. 

Highly esteemed Colleague : It gives me special pleasure to address 
you by this title, for on February 22nd of this year the Society of Scien- 
tific Friends of this place elected you as a foreign member. The send- 
ing of the diploma has up to the present been delayed merely because 
Professor Willdenow,f who is taking charge of it, wishes to include a 
few books at the same time. In the meantime, they are ready, as 
Count von Waldstein} has noted in the preface to Volume 4B of our 
New Publications. 

In proportion as this occasion, like all other opportunities for friendly 
correspondence with foreign friends and members of our Society has 
been pleasant and welcome to me,*just so deeply do I regret that this 
my first letter to you also concerns at the same time an unpleasant 
matter. Only within the last few days have I seen the fourth issue for 
1803 of Wieland’s New German Mercury , in which, to my greatest as- 
tonishment, I find myself accused, under the heading: “Further News 
of Hungary’s Most Recent Literature and Culture,” of downright 
theft; in other words, of having robbed you of the discovery of tel- 
lurium!! You, my dear colleague, will understand that I can by no 
means allow this insult to my honor and staining of my reputation to 
pass unnoticed. 

To be sure, I do remember that a chemical paper was handed to me 
in Vienna with the request for my opinion of it, which resulted favor- 
ably. However, as far as the subject matter of it is concerned, this I 
have completely forgotten, and the person who could inform me is 
Estner, who is now dead. But, on my honor, and by all that an honest 
man holds sacred, I assure you that that paper did not have the slight- 
est influence on my chemical experiment with tellurium. 

Long before my trip to Vienna, I had worked on this investigation, 
using a specimen which had been sent here by the late Mr. von 
Fichtel§ to Mr. Siegfried 1 1 ; I am also indebted to Mr. Muller von 
•Ludwig von Schedius (1768-1847). Hungarian writer, editor, cartographer, and 
humanitarian. 

f Karl Ludwig Willdenow (1765-1812). German botanist who studied chemistry 
under Klaproth. 

% Franz de Paula Adam Graf von Waldstein (1759-1823). Austrian botanist and 
philanthropist. 

$ Johann Ehrenreich von Fichtel ( 1732-1795). Hungarian mineralogist. 

J j Friedrich Wilhelm Siegfried (1734-1809). German mineralogist. 



Kitaibel and Klaproth on Tellurium 


177 


Reichenstein, who was then in Zalathna, for voluntarily sending me 
his supply of tellurium ores, which enabled me to carry my earlier 
investigations farther. 

I urgently request and expect a prompt and obliging reply in order 
to learn whether you yourself will be so good as to arrange that a public 
denial of this accusation of plagiarism made against me may be made 
as soon as possible; which I shall regard as valuable evidence, not so 
much of your own love of truth, which I by no means question, as of 
your friendly and fraternal attitude toward me. 

With the best regards of all the regular members of our Society, I 
have the honor to be, Sir, 

Your obedient friend and colleague, 
(Signed) Klaproth. 

Royal Chief Counselor of Medicine and Sanitation 


Kitaibel replied as follows : 
Highly Esteemed Colleague: 


vSept. 19, 1803. 


I received your letter [of September 2nd, 1803] only day before 
yesterday. Pleased though I was at first to see your esteemed name 
signed to it, yet all the more deeply was I disconcerted over the real 
occasion for it: partly because I now truly believe that you have been 
unjustly insulted; partly because your demand places me in an em- 
barrassing situation from which I do not know how to extricate myself. 
In order to enable you yourself to judge of this matter and of what can 
be done to ease your mind, I must make you better acquainted with all 
the details, which perhaps you do not yet correctly know. 

I discovered tellurium in 1789 in Born’s so-called molybdic silver. 
The following year I mentioned it verbally to Mr. Estner and after 
some time sent him at his request a written article on the experiments 
I had made with this metal. He and Mine Captain Haidinger ex- 
pressed to me the opinion that the metal I had discovered probably lay 
hidden also in the [nagyagite] “Transylvanian gray gold” (as Born 
called the ores containing this tellurium) , whereby I was led to find this 
metal also in the aforementioned ores, of which Estner and Haidinger 
immediately received notice. The announcement of this discovery 
was delayed by circumstances which need not be mentioned here. 

Then you came to Vienna, obtained from Estner my article on the 
investigation of the so-called silver molybdenite and another one on 
hydroferrocyanic acid prepared in the free state, for your opinion, and 
Estner sent me your written verdict with the information that he had 
also communicated to you my report on the metal which lay hidden in 
Transylvanian gold ores and had requested you to investigate the mat- 
ter further. I rejoiced over this all the more bec&use I had good reason 
to hope that, when you announced your investigation, you would men- 
tion my work. 

When I came to Vienna in the following year, your discovery of 
tellurium was just being read, and Estner said that he was greatly sur- 
prised that you had made absolutely no mention of my report which 
had been communicated to you. It was also mentioned in presence of 
others, wherefrom- 1 suspected no consequences whatever. After a 



178 


Discovery of the Elements 


long time I was also questioned verbally about the details of the affair, 
and a foreigner also sent me a written inquiry. Without knowing how 
they had learned of the matter, I answered according to my knowledge 
and belief. I now see, to be sure, that it would have been better if I 
had suppressed what I knew; but you see, too, that we were both 
wrong, you, in that you did not mention what you had learned of my 
discoveries through Mr. Estner; and I, in that I mentioned what I 
knew. 

You will understand that it is now difficult to set matters right. I 
cannot say that you knew nothing of my experiments; my article 
dated by Estner, your written statement, and Estner’s letter prove the 
contrary. If you were to say that you had forgotten about it and had 
already made the discovery earlier, I and many others would not 
doubt it, but this would not sufficiently vindicate you before all men ; 
although no one would have doubted your discovery if you had previ- 
ously said that you had made it before your trip to Vienna. If I were 
to say that the details of the matter were other than what I have just 
written, and which are already known, I would be contradicting my- 
self and speaking falsely. 

Under such circumstances I do not know what you mean by a public 
denial which you demand of me. I can give you a statement that my 
two papers. . .which Abb€ Estner gave you in Vienna for your verdict 
were not concerned with the tellurium of the Transylvanian gold ore 
but with Born's molybdic silver and free hydroferrocyanic acid; I can 
add that I believe that you discovered tellurium without knowing 
anything about my researches, if that will satisfy you. If you can 
with justice demand more, I ask you to mention it and you will always 
find, .me ready to do everything which your honor demands and mine 
permits, for I willingly believe you. That you forgot the contents of 
my paper, that you discovered tellurium without knowing anything 
about this, and that, although the premises are true and give cause for 
detrimental consequences, you were unjustly insulted. 

I remain, however, with best regards, Sir, 

Your devoted and respectful friend, 
Kfitaibel] 

Klaproth replied as follows : 

Berlin, Oct. 4, 1803. 

Highly esteemed Colleague : 

I am greatly indebted to you for your obligingly prompt reply to my 
last letter. I must confess, however, that its contents by no means ful- 
filled my expectations as completely as I had hoped. In the meantime 
I ask you to pardon me if I am wrong [in believing] that there still re- 
mains in your mind some doubt as to the truth of my explanation : 
that the article which Estner communicated to me in Vienna has not had 
the slightest influence on my experiments with tellurium . Only now does 
your present letter recall to my mind that I have been concerned with 
the subject of molybdic silver; but, as regards what you said about it, 
even at this moment I remember not a single syllable, and I all the 
more regret that you did not publish this work of yours long ago. I 
boldly and confidently ask all my friends, here and abroad, who know 
me better, If it is in any way compatible with my character to be a 



Muller von Reichenstein’s Priority Acknowledged 


179 


plagiarist and if they cannot attest on the contrary that discoveries 
which belong to me have reached the public through others, without 
my being able to claim them. Yes, indeed. Even today I would 
rather have made a dozen fewer discoveries than to bear for a moment 
the slightest suspicion that I could seize the literary property of others. 

I believe I have already mentioned in my preceding letter that, 
several years before my trip to Vienna, perhaps in 1785 to 1786, I had 
already worked with the so-called auro problematico which the late Mr. 
von Fichtel had sent here to my honored friend, Treasurer Siegfried, 
and that I was guided by the experiments which Mr. Muller von Reich- 
enstein had made and had described in the Physical Researches , and 
whose belief that it contains a new metal I found to be well grounded; 
to which conclusion the beautiful criterion previously announced by 
M. v. R., the red color which this metal imparts to sulfuric acid, was 
also of special value. Several of my friends here and members of my 
audience at that time can and will testify to this. 

Now just what have I done? Nothing, except to carry out a few 
little experiments in addition to those published by Mr. M. v. R. on 
the ore which he himself supplied. But I must almost surmise that 
you have not seen my complete paper on tellurium. Otherwise you 
could not possibly retain the error that I. . . [have claimed] the discovery. 
Nowhere have I said that; on the contrary, I have expressly and em- 
phatically explained that the credit for the discovery belongs to Mr. 
Muller von Reichenstein. Can one more definitely observe the suum 
cuiquef Now since I have never claimed the discovery, it is now as 
clear as day that I cannot have robbed anyone of this honor. I shall 
now leave it to you, esteemed colleague, as to what course you may 
deem best to give complete satisfaction as soon as possible for my pub- 
licly insulted honor which, to this day, suffers blamelessly, without 
compelling me to appear in my own defense; for I hate scholastic feuds 
like sin. If this be done to my satisfaction, as I have occasion to hope 
that it will, it will incomparably increase my esteem and respect for 
you as a friend and colleague whose zeal and services in one of the 
most beautiful branches of natural science I gladly recognize and 
honor. 

With highest esteem, I remain, Sir, 

Your obedient friend and colleague, 
(Signed) Klaproth 

Thoroughly convinced of Klaproth’s integrity, Kitaibel promptly pub- 
lished the following explanation (10 ) : (Since the circumstances which gave 
rise to the unjust charge against Klaproth were stated in detail in the pre- 
ceding letters, they may be omitted here). v 


Pest, Oct. 18, 1803. 

. . .The correct conclusion to be drawn really amounts to this: that I 
discovered tellurium in a misunderstood and hitherto uncertain ore at a 
time when the individuality of this metal and its existence in the 
Transylvanian gold ores had not been publicly confirmed through the 
excellent researches pf Mr. Klaproth, and more than this I did not wish 
to claim for myself, as can be seen from the Zeitschrift von und fur Un- 



180 


Discovery of the Elements 


gam, volume 1, page 275 ff. For Mr. Klaproth has himself pointed 
out in volume 3, page 16 of his Bey tr age that the credit for the original 
discovery of tellurium belongs to Mr. Muller von Reichenstein, aulic 
counselor [Hofrath]. 

However, further inferences have been made and conclusions drawn 
from the aforementioned circumstances that Mr. Klaproth had bor- 
rowed from me the discovery of tellurium, which I hereby declare on 
the following grounds to be highly unjust and false: In the first place, 
Mr. Klaproth's blameless character is a security that he, who had no 
need for such a despicable means of increasing his great deserts and his 
most widespread renown, was incapable of any such action; in the sec- 
ond place, his researches on tellurium and tellurium ores are so exten- 
sive that they could not have been carried out so completely in the 
short time in which they appeared after his departure from Vienna; 
in the third place, there is considerable difference between Mr. Klap- 
roth’s researches and my own, not only in the success of a few experi- 
ments, but also in the completeness of their execution. I found, for 
example, that tellurium is precipitated from nitric acid by water and 
that the concentrated sulfuric acid from this metal becomes at first 
brown, then red, and finally, after continued heating, becomes colorless 
again. Mr. Klaproth’s investigation, on the contrary, left mine far 
behind in completeness, hence the two cannot be compared; finally, 
Mr. Klaproth could certainly not borrow from me a discovery which 
belongs neither to him nor to me (NB. For [the statement]: “Mr. 
Klaproth has himself already pointed out in volume 3, page 10 of his 
Beytrage that the credit for the original discovery of tellurium belongs 
to Mr. Muller von Reichenstein, aulic counselor” has been mentioned 
here on page 4611), as Abb6 Eder* has so correctly observed in the 
Zeitschrift von und fur Ungarn , volume 2, page 90. 

Paul Kitaibel, Professor. 

Professor Kitaibel’s love for botany was stimulated by his opportunity 
to arrange the rich herbarium of Counselor Mygind, a friend of Linn£. 
In 1793, after a scientific tour of Croatia, he returned to Pest to join the 
staff of the school of pharmacy. After managing the botanical garden for 
a time, he became a professor of botany and chemistry, giving no lectures, 
however, but spending most of his time on scientific expeditions. In 1795 
and 1796 he studied the chalybeate spring at Bardiov [Bartfeld, or B&rtfa] 
and the flora of the Carpathians, and with Count Franz Adam von Wald- 
stein explored the territory around the Sea of Marmora. On a visit to 
Berlin he met Willdenow, who later named a genus of malvaceae Kitaibelia 
in his honor. He also explored the beautiful shores of Lake Balaton (the 
Plattensee, famous for its delicious fish), the fertile Banat, and most of 
Hungary. 

Kitaibel published a number of books and articles on the flora and mineral 
waters of Hungary, and, according to Professor L. von Szathm&ry (71), 
he was the first to prepare solid bleaching powder and use it for bleaching 

* Joseph Karl Eder ( 1766-1810). Transylvanian historian and mineralogist. 



Literature Cited 


181 


textiles. Kitaibel died at Budapest on December 13, 1817, at the age of 
sixty-three years; Klaproth’s life had come to a close on New Year’s 
Day of the same year. One of their younger contemporaries wrote for the 
botanical journal Flora a memorial article entitled “Some Flowers on the 
Grave of Paul Kitaibel” (5), in which appears the following characteriza- 
tion: “Honest and outspoken, expressing his opinion openly among his 
friends, and brandishing the lash of the satyrs, he disdained (although 
sought out because of the kindness of his disposition, the extent of his 
knowledge, and the force of his intellect) all vain social formalities. . 

Kitaibel’s valuable library was purchased by the National Museum of 
Budapest, which still treasures the letters which have here been cited. 
Although this intimate correspondence refers to a disconcerting and em- 
barrassing situation in their lives, it casts no shadow on the reputation of 
either Klaproth or Kitaibel. Their names, on the contrary, shine all the 
more brightly today because they refrained from the bitter polemics of the 
printed page and settled their serious misunderstanding through the ex- 
change of these restrained aud courteous letters. 

The author is deeply indebted to Dr. Max Speter of Berlin and to Dr. L 
von Szathm&ry of Budapest for the use of their notes and of the Klaproth- 
Kitaibel correspondence, for their many gracious and helpful suggestions, 
and for the reading of the manuscript; and to Dr. Franti^ek Fiala, director 
of the State Museum of Mines of Stiavnica Bahskd, for his kindness in 
sending photographs and information regarding the former School of 
Mines of Schemnitz. It is also a pleasure to acknowledge the assistance 
received from the Graduate Research Fund of the University of Kansas for 
translations from the Hungarian, which were made by Mr. Julius Nagy of 
Chicago. 


Literature Cited 

( 1 ) SzathmAry, LAszl6, "Paul Kitaibel, the Hungarian chemist,” Magyar Gydgys - 
zerisztud. Tdrsasdg Urtesitoje, No. 4 , 1-35 (1931); "Concerning the polemics 
which led to the discovery of tellurium," ibid., No. 1, 1-11 (1932). 

(2) Muller, F. J., "Uber den vermeintlichen natiirlichen Spiessglaskonig, ’ ’ Physi- 
kalische Arbeiten der eintrdchtigen Freunde in Wien , 1 (1), 57-9 (1783). 

( 3 ) MOllbr, F. J., "Versuch mit dem in der Grube Mariahilf in dem Gebirge Facebaj 
bei Zalatna vorkommenden vermeinten gediegenen Spiessglaskonig,’ * ibid., 1 (1) 
63-9 (1783); 1 (2), 49-53 (1784); 1 (3), 34-52 (1785). f 

(4) von Waldstbin, Waldauf, "Ueber den eigentlichen Entdecker des Tellurerzes," 
Vaterldndische Blatter filr den dsterreichischen Kaiserstaat, 1, 515-6 (Oct. 3, 1818). 

(5) Schultes, “Einige Blumen auf das Grab Paul Kitaibel’s,” Flora , 14 , 149-59 
(1831). 

(6) von Wurzbach, C., "Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich.” 
Kaiserlich-kdnigliche Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, 1864 , Vol. 11, pp. 337-9. This 
lexicon also contains biographical sketches of Born, Fichtel, Haidinger, Muller von 
Reichenstein, Filler, Rupprecht, Schedius, and Waldstein. 



182 Discovery of the Elements 

(7) D6bling, H., “Die Chemie in Jena zur Goethezeit,” Gustav Fischer, Jena, 1928, 

220 pp. 

(S) Klaproth, M. H., “Analytical Essays towards Promoting the Chemical Knowl- 
edge of Mineral Substances/’ Cadell and Davies, London, 1801, pp. 218-20. 
(Klaproth found no silver in this ore.) 

(9) “Fortgesetzte Nachrichten iiber Ungarns neueste Literatur und Kultur,” Der 
neue deutsche Merkur, Stuck 4 , 298-9 (1803). 

(10) Kitaibel, P., “Erklarung,” Gehlen's AUgem . J. der Chemie , 1, 460-1 (1803). 

(11) von SzathmAry, L., “Paul Kitaibel entdeckt den Chlorkalk,” Chem.-Ztg ., 55, 
645 (Aug. 22, 1931); ibid ., 55, 784 (Oct. 10. 1931). 




XI. COLUMBIUM, TANTALUM, AND VANADIUM 


Although the metals columbium f tantalum , and vanadium were recognized 
very early in the nineteenth century , the difficult task of preparing them in a 
pure state is an achievement of recent years. In 1801 the English chemist , 
Charles Hatchett , discovered a new element in a specimen of columbite which 
had an interesting connection with the history of New England . In the same 
year A. M. del Rio , a professor of mineralogy in Mexico , examined some 
“ brown lead from Zimapdn ” and announced the discovery of a new metal , 
erythronium. In the following year Berzelius' professor , A . G. Ekeberg, 
analyzed some tantalite from Finland and found in it an element very similar to 
Hatchett's columbium. Although Dr . Wollaston believed that columbium 
and tantalum are identical , Heinrich Rose and Marignac proved that they 
are two distinct elements. In 1831 Sef strom found in some soft iron from 
Eckersholm a metal , vanadium , which Wohler proved to be identical with del 
Rio's erythronium. 


It is impossible that he who h 
science can ever abaridon it (2). 

Columbium 

The element columbium (niobium) 
was discovered in 1801 by the English 
chemist, Charles Hatchett, * who was 
born in London in 1765. As a young 
man in his thirties he engaged actively 
in chemical research, and published 
in the Philosophical Transactions an 
analysis of lead molybdate from 
Carinthia and the results of some ex- 
periments on shell and bone ( 2), and 
in Nicholson's Journal an analysis of 
an earth from New South Wales called 
“Sydneia, or Terra Australis’ ' (31). 

The discovery on which his fame 
rests was announced before the Royal 
Society on November 26, 1801 in a 
paper entitled “Analysis of a Mineral 
from North America containing a 
Metal hitherto Unknown” (5). This 
mineral, now known as columbite, is 
a black rock found in New England, 
and the specimen Hatchett analyzed 

* See also Chapter XII, pp. 206-24. 


once imbibed a taste for 



Edgar Fahs Smith Memorial Collection, 
¥ V niversity of Pennsylvania 

Charles Hatchett, 1765-1847 
English chemist and manufacturer. 
Discoverer of columbium. Most of his 
researches were in analytical and min- 
eralogical chemistry. 

had an interesting history. 


183 



184 


Discovery of the Elements 


Governor John Winthrop the 
Younger (30), (46), (52) used to take 
great pleasure in examining minerals, 
and his manner of collecting them is 
best described in the quaint words of 
an early American poet: 

Sometimes his wary steps, but 
wand' ring too, 

Would carry him the Chrystal 
Mountains to, 

Where Nature locks her Gems , 
each costly spark 
Mocking the Stars, spher'd in their * 
Cloisters dark. 

Sometimes the Hough, anon the 
Gardners Spade 

He deigned to use, and tools of th ' 
Chymick trade (47). 

On one of these expeditions he may 
1 have found in a spring near his 
home at New London, Connecticut, 
the rock fragment of columbite which 
his grandson sent to Sir Hans Sloane 
(1660-1753) in London, who placed 
it in the British Museum (4).* The 
specimen had evidently remained in 
the museum for several decades 
before Charles Hatchett analyzed it. 
Since columbite is a very complex mineral indeed, containing columbic, 
tantalic, titanic, and tungstic acids, zirconia, thoria, ceria, and yttria, 
Hatchett must have possessed great analytical ability in order to discover 
in it the new element, columbium. Although the greatest chemists in 
Europe held for more than forty years the erroneous opinion that co- 
lumbium and tantalum are identical, Marignac and Heinrich Rose finally 
proved that they are two distinct elements. Thus Hatchett was cor- 
rect in concluding that he had found a new metal in columbite (53). 

It is to be regretted that a man of such great ability should have given 
up his scientific research early in life. Thomas Thomson said of him in 
1830, “ . . . unfortunately this most amiable and accomplished man has 
been lost to science for more than a quarter of a century; the baneful 
effects of wealth, and the cares of a lucrative and extensive business having 
completely weaned him from scientific pursuits” (5). In 1845 Berzelius, 
* See Chapter XII* 



From Waters' U A Sketch of the Life of John 
Winthrop the Younger ” 


John Winthrop the Younger 
1606-1676 

First governor of Connecticut. Al- 
chemist, manufacturing chemist, and 
physician. His grandson sent the 
columbite from which Charles Hatchett 
later isolated the metal columbium. 



COLUMBIUM 


185 


writing to Wohler, ex- 
pressed a similar opinion : 

“On my previous visit 
here in Karlsbad/’ said 
he, “I made the personal 
acquaintance of your 
king as Prince of Cum- 
berland. He asked me if 
I knew a number of 
English chemists, and 
upon my replying that 
I knew Davy, Wollaston, 

Tennant, and Marcet, he 
shook his head and in- 
dicated that I had for- 
gotten the foremost one, 
namely, Hatchett. He 
seemed greatly pleased 
that I also knew him, 
however did not want 
to believe that he had 
given up chemistry and 
become a coach-maker 
as his father’s successor” 

( 6 ). Hatchett retired to 
his estate at Roehamp- 
ton, near London, and died at Chelsea on March 10, 1847. 

He never succeeded in isolating columbium, and in fact the element 
eluded chemists for more than six decades. In 1864, however, C. W. 
Blomstrand reduced columbium chloride by heating it strongly in an 
atmosphere of hydrogen ( 48 ), and saw the shining steel-gray metal. 

In 1901 Henri Moissan pulverized some American columbite, mixed with 
it some sugar charcoal, compressed the mixture, and heated it from seven 
to eight minutes in his electric furnace, using a current of one thousand 
amperes under fifty volts. After volatilizing all the manganese and part 
of the iron and silicon, he obtained a melt containing columbium and 
tantalum combined with carbon. * 

After preparing columbic acid by Marignac’s method, he mixed eighty- 
two parts of it with eighteen of sugar carbon, moistened the mixture 
slightly with turpentine, and pressed it into the form of a cylinder, which 
he heated in his electric furnace, using six hundred amperes under fifty 
volts. A violent reaction took place in accordance with the equation: 

CbsO« + 5C - 2Cb -f 5CO. 



Sir Hans Sloanb, 1000-1753 

Founder of the British Museum. Physician, phar- 
macist, traveler, and collector of books, manuscripts, 
coins, medals, gems, antiquities, and natural history 
specimens. 



186 


Discovery of the Elements 


After cooling the mixture out of contact with the nitrogen of the air, he 
found a well-fused ingot with a metallic fracture (49). Moissan’s co- 
lumbium contained a small amount of combined carbon, and was so inert 
and refractory that he believed the element to be a non-metal resembling 
boron and silicon. 

From 1904 to 1910 C. W. Bailee (7), (18), (55) analyzed many columbium 
and tantalum compounds and determined the atomic weights of both 
metals. In 1906 Werner von Bolton of the Siemens & Halslce Company 



Courtesy Fansteel Products Company, Inc. 

Photomicrograph of Columbium 
Approximately 300 X 


prepared a columbium regulus by an alumino-thermic method and purified 
it by repeated melting in a vacuum electric furnace (17), (18). For twenty- 
three years this little specimen in Germany continued to be the only piece 
of pure columbium in the world, but in May, 1929, Dr. Balke exhibited 
before the American Chemical Society some highly polished sheets and rods 
of this rare metal. Because less energy is required to remove an electron 



Tantalum 187 

from its surface than from that of any other refractory metal, columbium is 
used in vacuum tubes for high-power service ( 56 ). 

Tantalum 

Since minerals which contain columbium almost invariably contain 
also the closely related element, tantalum, it is small wonder that chemists 
at first confused the two elements. The discoverer of tantalum was the 



Edgar F. Smith Memorial Collection , University of Pennsylvania 

Autograph Letter of Charles Hatchett 


William Thomas Braude (1788-1866), Davy's successor at the Royal Institu- 
tion, was Charles Hatchett's son-in-law. The English edition of Brande’s 4l 'Manual 
of Chemistry* * was dedicated to Hatchett. 





188 


Discovery of the Elements 


Swedish chemist and mineralogist, Anders Gustaf Ekeberg. He was 
born at Stockholm on January 16, 1767, the son of Joseph Erik Ekeberg, 

a ship-builder in the service of the 
King. When he was ten years old he 
was sent to the school at Kalmar, and 
two years later he went to Soderokra, 
where he boarded at the home of the 
clergyman. It was there that he 
gained his first knowledge of Greek 
literature, a subject which gave him 
great pleasure throughout his life. 
When he was fourteen years old, he 
attended school at Westervik and at 
Carlscrona and was an apt scholar both 
in science and in art. 

He graduated from the University 
of Upsala in 1788, presenting a thesis 
on “Oils Extracted from Seeds,” and 

traveled, on salary, through Germany. 
* 

Anders Gustaf Ekeberg 
1767-1813 

vSwedish chemist, mineralogist, poet, 
and artist. Professor of Chemistry at 
Upsala when Berzelius was a student 
there. The discoverer of tantalum. 

He was one of the first chemists to 
investigate yttria. 

Soon after his return to Upsala in 
1790 he wrote a beautiful poem on the 
peace recently concluded between 
Sweden and Russia. In 1794, after 
publishing his first contribution to 
chemistry, he began his teaching career 
at Upsala. 

Ekeberg suffered throughout his life 
from physical handicaps. A severe 
cold in childhood made him partially 
deaf for the rest of his life, and in 1801, 
when a flask exploded in his hand, he 
lost the sight of one eye ($). 

When the royal family visited Up- 
sala in November of that year, an 
elaborate chemical exposition was held 
in their honor. A poem of three 



Henri Moissan, 1852-1907 
Professor of Chemistry at the £cole 
de Pharmacie and at the Sorbonne. 
The first to isolate fluorine and make a 
thorough study df its properties. With 
his electric furnace he prepared artificial 
diamonds and many rare metals. He 
brought about a revival of interest in 
inorganic chemical research. 



Tantalum 


189 


stanzas, which Ekeberg had composed and written with invisible ink, ap- 
peared in blue letters when the King warmed the paper. It began as fol- 
lows: 


That in our land the sciences' pure light 
Is mingled not with flash and gleam of sword , 

Oh Monarch , 7 is thy work. Accept our hearts' oblation . 

May we, too, celebrate , with joyous visages , 

The long-awaited hour when Peace the world doth greet (57).* 

Ekeberg became deeply interested 
in the wonderful minerals to be found 
at Ytterby and Fahlun, and made ex- 
cellent analyses of a number of them. 

In 1802 he analyzed a specimen of 
tantalite from Kimito, Finland, and 
another mineral, yttro tantalite, from 
Ytterby, and found that both con- 
tained a hitherto unknown metal. 

Because it had been such a tantalizing 
task to trace it down, Ekeberg named 
it tantalum {32). 

In 1809 Dr. Wollaston analyzed 
both columbite and tantalite {10). 

His conclusion that columbium and 
tantalum are identical was accepted by 
chemists until 1846, when Heinrich 
Rose (a grandson of Valentin Rose the 
Elder and son of the Rose whom Klap- 
roth educated) questioned it. Rose 
had made a thorough study of the 
columbites and tantalites from Amer- 
ica and from Bodenmais, Bavaria, and had extracted from them two acids 
which he called niobic (columbic) and pelopic acids. He found later, 
however, that the latter was not the acid of a new metal, as he had at first 
supposed, but that it contained niobium (columbium) in a lower state of 
oxidation. Rose stated that niobic and hyponiobic acids are both different 
from tantalic acid (II). 

Although columbic and tantalic acids are extremely difficult to separate, 
Marignac finally succeeded, not only in separating them, but also in show- 

* At Wetenskapers rena Dag 

Ej blandades hos oss med blixtarne of swdrden, 

Det dr ditt werk * Monark , vdrt hjertas offer tag! 

Wi fire , jemwdl wi , med glddjens anletsdrag 

Den Idnge drdgda stund f id Freden hdlsar werlden. 





Heinrich Rose, 1795-1864 

German analytical chemist and 
pharmacist. Son of Valentin Rose 
the Younger. His comparative study 
of American columbite and Bavarian 
tantalite proved that columbium 
(niobium) and tantalum are two dis- 
tinct metals. 



190 


Discovery of the Elements 


in g that columbium is both tri- and pentavalent, whereas tantalum always 
has a valence of five. The separation is based on the insolubility of potas- 
sium fluotantalate in comparison with potassium fluo-oxycolumbate {12), 
{20). In the United States the element discovered by Hatchett is known as 
columbium , but in Europe most chemists prefer to use the name niobium 
which Heinrich Rose gave it. 

Ekeberg’s later years were made less fruitful by continued illness. 
The few papers which he published contained the results of the analyses of 
minerals such as gadolinite, the topaz, and an ore of titanium. In his 
analysis of the mineral water of Medevi he was assisted by an obscure young 
student who was destined to bring great glory to the University of Upsala. 
The discovery of such a student as Berzelius was a far greater honor for 
Ekeberg than his disclosure of the rather rare element, tantalum. 

Berzelius warmly defended Ekeberg’s claim to the discovery of this 
element. In the autumn of 1814 he wrote to Thomas Thomson objecting 
to an alteration which had been made in an English translation of one of 
his memoirs. Berzelius had used the word tantalum , and Thomson had 
evidently substituted the word columbium , whereupon Berzelius wrote, 
“Without wishing to depreciate the merits of the celebrated Hatchett, 
it is nevertheless necessary to observe that tantalum and its properties in 
the metallic as well as in its oxidized* condition were not known at all before 
Mr. Ekeberg.” 

Berzelius went on to explain the differences between Ekeberg’s tantalum 
oxide and the columbium oxide prepared by Hatchett: 

Mr. Ekeberg received from a friend who had visited England [said 
he], a little portion of the columbic acid of Mr. Hatchett, and when the 
experiments of Mr. Wollaston came to his knowledge he examined 
that acid in a scrupulous manner. He recognized in it a large amount 
of tungstic acid which had given to the oxide its properties of reacting 
acid as well as those of combining with the alkalies and of coloring 
microcosmic salt. These observations of Mr. Ekeberg have gained 
still more weight by the discovery of a new fossil* that Mr. Gahn 
and I have just made near Fahlun, which fossil possesses the general 
properties of Mr. Hatchett’s columbite, and in the analysis of which 
we have found oxide of tantalum combined with tungstic acid. . . . 

Now, then [continued Berzelius], it is clear that the columbic acid 
of Mr. Hatchett, having been composed of oxide of tantalum and 
tungstic acid, which communicated to it a part of its specific properties, 
it is clear, I say, that Mr. Hatchett shares the discovery of tantalum 
in almost the same manner as MM. Fourcroy and Vauquelin share 
with Mr. Tennant the honor of having discovered osmium (“Thom- 
son's System," Ed. IV, Vol. 1, p. 200), and I suppose that you will 
not refuse to render the same justice to the work of the Swede Ekeberg 
that you have just rendered to the Englishman Tennant, f 
* A tan tali te from Broddbo. 
f See Part XIV, pp. 266-9. 



Tantalum 


191 


As for the name of the metal [said Berzelius], I do not think that the 
author of the discovery ought to count for much. For example you 
do not say menaccanite instead of titanium;* moreover Mr. Hatchett 
gave this name after the place where it was thought the fossil had been 
found; now it is not good practice to name elementary substances in 
chemistry after the places where they have first been found; not to 
mention the fact that the place where columbite was found is still 
doubtful, in the same degree as it is not certain that it comes from 
America. The name tantalum having none of these inconveniences 
and involving a beautiful meaning of a few properties of this particular 
metallic body, I have felt compelled to choose it by preference. 
The reason for the name tantalum (derived from the story of Tantalus) 
is still more valid if one adds that metallic tantalum, reduced to the 
finest powder, is not attacked by any acid, not even by aqua regia, 
concentrated and boiling (13). 

In his reply to this letter 
on November 5, Thomson 
explained that he had known 
very little about Ekeberg’s 
experiments and that his only 
reason for changing Berzel- 
ius’ nomenclature had been 
to make the article more 
intelligible to English read- 
ers. He then added : 

I regret that it never 
has been in my power to 
make experiments on 
either of these sub- 
stances (columbite or 
tantalite) . Ekeberg sup - 
plied me with a good 
many specimens, but the 
ship containing them 
and all my Swedish col- 
lection, which I valued 
highly, was sunk in the Thomas Thomson, 1773-1852 

Baltic, and all my prop- Scottish chemist and editor. The first distin- 

erty lost. Your fact guished advocate of Dalton’s atomic theory, 
about the new mineral Author of a two- volume “History of Chemistry” 

like collumbite (sic) is characterized by its scientific accuracy and beau- 

very interesting. I shall tiM literary style * 

insert what you have told me in the next number of my journal. It is 
all unknown here (14). 

On March 29, 1815, Dr. Marcet wrote to Berzelius; 

* See Part XVIII, pp. 318-22. 



192 


Discovery of the Elements 


.... Dr. Wollaston made some time ago in my presence a little 
experimental inquiry on wolfram and tantalite and columbite, by 
which it appeared that Hatchett’s columbite did not contain any 
tungsten, and that therefore he did not make the mistake you sus- 
pected he had made. If you are curious to have the details, I shall 
send them to you (15). 

After prolonged suffering with tuberculosis, Ekeberg died at Upsala on 
February 11, 1813, at the early age of forty-six years. In a letter to 
Dr. Marcet (16), Berzelius paid the following tribute to his gifted teacher: 
“Ekeberg has just died after a long, sad, hectic illness. He was one of 
the most lovable of men, he had sound knowledge, and an irresistible 
propensity for work. He was a good chemist and mineralogist, a good 
poet and an excellent artist.”* Ekeberg had a kind, friendly, merry spirit 
that frequently soared above poverty and suffering, and his love of litera- 
ture and art was a constant solace to him. 


Tantalum can be separated from columbium by recrystallization of the 



Courtesy Fansteel Products Company, Inc. 

Laboratory Equipment Made from Tantalum 


double potassium fluorides. 
In the commercial process 
the ore is fused with caus- 
tic soda. The insoluble 
sodium columbate, sodium 
tantalate, and iron tanta- 
late are filtered off from 
the soluble sodium salts, 
and the iron is removed 
by treatment with hydro- 
chloric acid. The colum- 
bic and tantalic acids are 


treated with hydrofluoric acid and enough potassium fluoride to convert 
the tantalum into the double fluoride, K^TaF:, which is then recry s- 
tallized from water containing a little hydrofluoric acid (7). 

After Werner von Bolton of Charlottenburg succeeded in 1903 in refining 
the metal, it soon acquired a limited use as filaments (34), It was found, 
moreover, that surgical and dental instruments made from it can be 
sterilized by heating or by immersion in acids without damage to the 
tantalum. Since, the price was almost prohibitive, however, Dr. Balke set 
to work in Chicago to make the metal on a commercial scale. Using as his 
raw material a rich tantalum ore from the desolate Pilbarra region of 
western Australia, he finally succeeded in February, 1922, in preparing a 
tantalum ingot which was passed repeatedly through a rolling mill to 
produce a flawless piece of sheet metal (8), (19). 


* “Ekeberg vient de mourir aprh une maladie hectique longue et malheureuse. Cet 
homme itait des plus aimaUes; il possSdait des connaissances solides et un penchant irrisisti - 
He pour le travail. II Slait bon chimisie et minSralogue, heureux poUe et trks bon peintrt** 


Tantalum and Vanadium 


193 



Tantalum is now made into spinnerets for the manufacture of rayon, 
into electrodes for the neon signs that give our Great White Ways a rud- 
dier light, and into fine jewelry with 
iridescent colors. Its most interesting 
use, however, depends on its peculiar 
electrochemical behavior caused by 
the insolubility of its oxide in acid 
solutions. When an alternating cur- 
rent is passed through a vessel con- 
taining sulfuric acid, a bar of lead 
and a bar of tantalum (or of colum- 
bium), it becomes a direct current (7), 

(19), Thus, because direct current 
was needed in the early days of radio reception, Ekeberg’s tantalizing metal, 
in the form of radio rectifiers, “B” battery eliminators and trickle chargers, 
entered into the home life of thousands upon thousands of families. 


Courtesy Fansteel Products Company, Inc. 

Tantalum for Watch Cases 



SefstrGm’s Autograph on Title 
Page of Berzelius’ Treatise on 
the Blowpipe 

* See Chapter XIII, pp.* 225-35. 


Vanadium 

In 1801, the year in which Hatchett 
discovered columbium, Andr6s Man- 
uel del Rio, a professor of mineralogy 
in Mexico, examined a specimen of 
brown lead from Zimapdn and con- 
cluded that it contained a new metal 
similar to chromium and uranium. 
Very little has been written concerning 
the personal life of del Rio.* He was 
born in Madrid on November 10, 
1764, studied at Freiberg and at 
Schemnitz, and finally became a pro- 
fessor in the School of Mines! (Colegio 
de Minerla) in Mexico City, where 
he taught for about fifty years (1795- 
1849) (2), (50), (51). 

It was there that he discovered a 
new metal which, because of the red 
color that it# salts acquire when 
heated, he named erythronium (44), 
Upon further study, however, he de- 
cided that he was mistaken, and that 
the brown lead from Zimap&n was 
merely a basic lead chromate contain- 


194 


Discovery of the Elements 


ing 80.72% of lead oxide and 14.80% of chromic acid (12 ) . His paper there- 
fore bore the modest title, ‘‘Discovery of Chromium in the Brown Lead of 
Zimapdn” (21)- In 1805 Collet-Descotils confirmed del Rio's analysis 
(22), and for twenty-five years no more was heard of the new element, 
erythronium. 

In 1820 del Rio went to the Spanish court to plead for Mexican in- 
dependence. His paper (1) on the “Analysis of an alloy of gold and 
rhodium from the parting house at Mexico" was published in the Annals 
of Philosophy in October, 1825. The closing years of his long useful 
life were spent in Mexico, where he died on March 23, 1849. 

In 1831 the Swedish chemist, Nils Gabriel Sefstrom, discovered a new 
element in iron from the Taberg mine in Sm&land. Sefstrom was born on 
June 2, 1787, at Ilsbo Socken, Norra Helsingland (2). He studied medicine, 
and received his medical degree at the age of twenty-six years. After 
four years of practice in a hospital, he became a professor of chemistry 
and science at the Caroline Institute of Medicine and Surgery, and from 
1820 to 1839 he taught chemistry at the newly erected School of Mines at 
Fahlun (2), (54). 

It was there that he made the remarkable discovery that Berzelius de- 
scribed so charmingly to Wohler in his letter of January 22, 1831: 

In regard to the sample which I am sending with this, I want to tell 
the following anecdote : In the far north there lived in olden times 
the goddess Vanadis, beautiful and lovable. One day some one 
knocked at her door. The goddess remained comfortably seated and 
thought : let the person knock again ; but there was no more knock- 
ing, and the one who had knocked went down 
the steps. The goddess was curious to see who 
it might be that was so indifferent to being 
admitted, sprang to the window, and looked at 
the one who was going away. Alas! she said to 
herself, that’s that fellow Wohler. Well, he 
surely deserved it; if he had been a little more 
concerned about it, he would have been ad- 
mitted. The fellow does not look up to the 
window once in passing by. . . . 

After a few days some one knocked again at 
the door; but this time the knocking continued. 
The goddess finally came herself and opened 
the door. Sefstrom entered, and from this 
union vanadium was born . That is the name of 
the new metal, whose former name suggesting 
Brian, meaning wool (whence Erianae was edu- 
cated, since Minerva taught human beings to 
spin wool), has been rejected. The Herr Pro- 
fessor guessed correctly that the lead mineral 
from Zimapan contains vanadium and not chro- 



Nils Gabriel SefstrOm 
1787-1845 

Swedish physician and 
chemist. Professor at the 
Caroline Institute of 
Medicine and Surgery 
and at the School of Mines 
in Stockholm. In 1831 
he discovered vanadium, 
an element that proved to 
be identical with del Rio's 
“eiTthronium.” 


Vanadium 


195 


mium. Sef strom himself proved with the little specimen belonging to 
the professor that it is vanadium oxide. 

Vanadium [continued Berzelius] is a thing which is very hard to find. 

It is related to everything with which it forms compounds in definite 
proportions, even with silica, so that only now have I been able to ob- 
tain it pure. In Sefstrom’s vanadium oxide which he brought with 
him are found phosphoric acid, silica, alumina, zirconia, and ferric 
oxide, of whose presence we had no suspicion, but which we, because 
of ambiguous results, had to remove, one after another; so that in the 
three weeks which Sefstrom spent in working with me, we confined 
ourselves almost entirely to the task of finding these impurities and of 
thinking out ways of removing them. Sefstrom had to go home, 
but left me so much vanadium that I have been in no embarrass- 
ment over the continuance of the investigation. I shall send the 
Herr Professor some of it later, when I see about how much 
I can spare; but now in the midst of the research I need all I have 
(23). 

Berzelius then consoled Wohler for his failure to discover vanadium, 
saying it required more genius to synthesize urea than to discover ten new 
elements (58). “I have mailed to Poggendorff,” he continued, “a little 
paper on vanadium by Sefstrom. I have also engaged Sefstrom to present 
it to the Academy so that his name alone may be linked with the discovery, 
which would not be the case if the first paper on it appeared under his and 
my name together. Thus it also becomes possible to announce the dis- 
covery sooner than if we had to wait for the conclusion of my research, 
which surely cannot be completed so quickly” (23). 

Two weeks later Wohler replied : 

A thousand thanks, dear professor, for your kind letter with the 
beautiful story about the goddess Vanadis, which gave me great 
pleasure, although, frankly, it vexed me a little, though only at first, 
to have made no visit to the beautiful one. Even if I had charmed her 
out of the lead mineral, I would have had only half the honor of dis- 
covery, because of the earlier results of del Rio on erythronium. But 
Sefstrom, because he succeeded by an entirely different method, keeps 
the honor unshared. As soon as I know the intimate relations of the 
metal, and you have sent me a little of it, I will analyze the lead 
mineral. . . . 

Anticipatory as it may seem [continued Wohler] yet, because of 
the slowness of the mails, it is time to ask whether, when I publish a 
notice of the mineral, I ought to give its earlier history, the supposed 
discovery by del Rio of a new metal in it, the refutation by Descotils? 
that Humboldt brought it with him, etc. ? I would not want in the 
least to take away from Sefstrom anything of his priority of discovery, 
especially since such indecision is repugnant in cases like this; on the 
other hand one must not expose one's self to the charge by the public or 
especially by one's opponents that one through partisanship concealed 
earlier claims. In any case Humboldt shall be named, since he alone 
brought it with him, and with that the rest seems unavoidably linked. 
Do not laugh at me because of my diplomatic question ( 23 ). 



196 


Discovery of the Elements 


The keenness of Wohler’s disappointment is more definitely expressed 
in his letter to Liebig of January 2, 1831, in which he writes: 

... at the moment I am interested only in the new Swedish metal, 
vanadium, discovered by Sefstrom, but really by Berzelius. Ich war 
ein Esel not to have discovered it before in the brown lead ore from 
Zimapan, Mexico. I was engaged in analyzing it and had already 
found in it something new when, in consequence of hydrogen fluoride 
vapor, I became ill for several months (24 ) . 



From Thomas Thomson's " Travels in Sweden During the Autumn of 1812" 


Taberg, SmAland, Sweden 

Sefstrom discovered vanadium in iron from the Taberg mine. 


For a description of Sefstrom’s method of isolating vanadium, it is 
necessary to quote again from the correspondence of Berzelius, this time 
from a letter to Dulong. On January 7, 1831, he wrote: 

I must tell you of the discovery of a new metallic substance, of 
which this letter contains some preparations. . , . The discovery 
was made by Mr. Sefstrom, director of the School of Mines at Fahlun, 
who, wishing to examine a kind of iron remarkable for its extreme 
softness, found in it, in extremely small quantity, a substance whose 
properties appear to differ from those of bodies hitherto known, but the 
quantity of which was so infinitely small that too much expense would 
have been necessary in order to extract enough of it to permit of 




Vanadium 


197 


closer examination. This iron was taken from the Taberg mine in 
Sm&land, which however contains only traces of the new body, but 
Mr. Sefstrom, having found that the cast iron contained more of it 
than the wrought iron, concluded that the scoria formed during the 
conversion of the cast iron to malleable iron ought to contain larger 
quantities of it. This proved to be true. Mr. Sefstrom extracted 
portions of it which sufficed for studying it, and during his Christmas 
vacation came to see me, to finish with me the study of “the stranger 
(nouveau d6barqu4)” (25). 


Sefstrom’s own ac- 
count of the discovery 
is also of great in- 
terest : 


It is several years 
[said he], since 
Rinman , the 
manager of the 
mine, in order to 
discover easily 
whether an iron 
was brittle, gave 
a method which 
depends on the 
circumstance that 
such an iron, 
when attacked by 
muriatic (hydro- 
chloric) acid, 
gives a black pow- 
der. Having oc- 
casionally treated 
in this manner an 
iron which was 
not brittle, and 
finally some iron 
from Eckersholm, 
I was greatly sur- 
prised to recog- 
nize in the latter 
the reaction of a 
brittle iron, al- 



Andr£s Manuel del Rio 
1764-1849 


though the iron Spanish-Mexican scientist. Tor half a century he was 

from Taberg professor of mineralogy at the School of Mines of Mexico, 
passes for the 

most flexible and tenacious that we have. I did not then have the 
leisure to investigate the nature of the black powder; but in April, 
1830, I resinned my experiments to see if it contained phosphorus or 
any other substance, which was for me not without importance. 

I dissolved a considerable quantity of iron in muriatic acid [Sefstrom 


198 


Discovery of the Elements 


then continued] and I noticed that, while it was dissolving, a few par- 
ticles of iron, mainly those which deposit the black powder, dissolved 
more rapidly than the others, in such a way that there remained hol- 
low veins in the midst of the iron bar. Upon examining this black 
powder, I found silica, iron, alumina, lime, copper, and, among other 
things, uranium. I could not discover in what condition this substance 
was, because the small quantity of powder did not exceed two deci- 
grams, and, moreover, more than half of it was silica. After several 
experiments I saw that it was not chromium, and the comparative tests 
that I made proved to me that it certainly was not uranium. I 
had sought to compare the highest degrees of oxidation, but I must 
remark that vanadium is found partly in the lower degree (26). 

In one of his letters Berzelius mentioned to Wohler an unfortunate 
accident: “ ... As Sefstrom came home to Fahlun,” said he, “to take up 
there the study of the vanadium alloy, a student spilled about one lot 
(ten grams) of dissolved vanadium oxide in such a way that none of it 
could be saved. Now he has nothing with which he can work, and must 
repeat the entire preparation process on the slag” (27). 

In May, 1830, a careful comparison of vanadium and uranium was made 

in Berzelius’ laboratory. It was found 
„that vanadium forms two series 
of compounds, the vanadic and the 
vanadous, but Berzelius and Sefstrom 
did not succeed in isolating the 
metal. Sefstrom died at Stockholm 
on November 30, 1845, at the age of 
fifty-eight years. 

Wohler’s researches (45) proved 
that he had been correct in believing 
that the ore del Rfo had analyzed 
in 1801 really contained vanadium 
instead of chromium (26). This 
mineral is now known as vanadinite, 
PbCl 2 -3Pba(V0 4 )2. 

The final step in the discovery of 
vanadium was accomplished by the 
English chemist, Sir Henry Enfield 
Roscoe, who was bom in London on 
January 7, 1833. When he was nine 
years old the family moved to Liver- 
pool. One of his first schoolmasters 
reported that “Roscoe is a nice boy, 
but he looks about him too much, 
and does not know his irregular 



Sir Edward (T. E.) Thorpe, 1845-1925 

English chemist famous for his re- 
search on the specific volumes of liquids 
in relation to their chemical constitu- 
tion, and for his work on the oxides of 
phosphorus and the compounds of va- 
nadium done in collaboration with Sir 
Henry Roscoe. Author of excellent 
textbooks of chemistry and of biogra- 
phies and essays in historical chemistry. 



Vanadium 


199 


verbs” («?£). His mother, who evidently did not object seriously to this 
habit of “looking about,” encouraged him to make chemical experiments at 
home and allowed him to transform one of the rooms into a laboratory. 

At the age of fifteen years the boy entered University College, London, 
where he studied under Thomas Graham and Alexander William William- 
son. After graduating in 1853 with honors in chemistry, he went to Heidel- 
berg to study quantitative analysis in the old monastery that had been 
transformed into a laboratory for Bun- 
sen. After passing his doctor’s exami- 
nation summa cum laude , he collabo- 
rated with Bunsen in the famous re- 
searches on the chemical action of 
light. During their long friendship 
Roscoe received from the great Ger- 
man master one hundred twenty -six 
letters, which he carefully preserved 
and finally presented in bound form to 
the Bunsen -Gesellschaft (38). 

When only twenty-four years old, 

Roscoe succeeded Frankland as profes- 
sor of chemistry at the University of 
Manchester. In the winter of 1862, 
when thousands of employees in the 
cotton mills of Lancashire were thrown 
out of work because of the Civil War 
in America, Roscoe, in an effort to re- 
lieve the mental depression of the un- 
employed, instituted a series of popular 
“Science Lectures for the People.” 

Roscoe, Tyndall, Huxley, and other 
noted scientists addressed large and 
appreciative audiences each week for 
eleven consecutive winters, and the 
printed lectures were afterward sold for 
a penny all over the world (39). In 
his teaching Roscoe emphasized the 
need of liberal culture as a basis for technical training (28). 

In about 1865 he found that some of the copper veins of the Lower 
Keuper Sandstone of the Trias in Cheshire contained vanadium (37) and 
that one of the lime precipitates from this ore contained about two per 
cent of it. It was from this unpromising material that Roscoe and Sir 
Edward Thorpe laboriously prepared the pure vanadium compounds needed 
for a thorough study of the element. 



Carl Friedrich Rammelsbbrg 
1813-1899 

German chemist, mineralogist, and 
crystallographer who demonstrated 
the isomorphism of sulfur and selenium 
crystals obtained from carbon bisulfide 
solutions of these elements, and showed 
that the vanadates are isomorphous 
with the phosphates. He also deter- 
mined the crystal forms of many or- 
ganic compounds, and wrote textbooks 
on crystallography, metallurgy, and 
mineralogical and analytical chemistry 


200 


Discovery of the Elements 


When Roscoe investigated them he found that vanadium is a tri- and 
pentavalent element of the phosphorus group. He also discovered that 
what Berzelius had taken for the metal was really the mononitride, VN, 
and that most of the vanadium compounds studied by the Swedish chem- 
ists had contained oxygen. 

On August 26, 1867, Roscoe wrote to Thorpe saying, 

... I want you very much to stay with me till April to settle the 
vanadium and light matters and help me in London with my lec- 
tures. . . I have at last found out about vanadium. The acid is 
VaOft like P 2 O 6 . The chloride VOCl 3 like POCl 8 and the solid chlo- 
rides VOClj, VOC1, etc. This explains the isomorphism of the 
vanadate of lead and the corresponding phosphate and lots of other 
points. It becomes very interesting now. . . (40). 

On September 12 of the same year Roscoe wrote again to his assistant: 

Please ask Joseph [Hey wood] to send me per book-post Pogg. Ann., 
vol. 98, in which volume is Rammelsberg’s paper on the isomor- 
phism of vanadates and phosphates. There is no doubt in my mind 
that vanadic acid is V2O5, and it will be exceedingly interesting to 
work out the vanadates, which must all be explained as phosphates. 
The ordinary white NH S salt is NH4VO3 (like NaP0 3 ) and is a meta- 
vanadate. The bi- vanadates can also be explained, but all need 
re-preparation and analysis. Did I tell you that we have now got 
V*Ob, V2O4, V2O,, V2O2 (I wish we had V also!), V 2 0 2 C1 6 , V2O2CI4, 
VjC^Clj, or VOClj, VOCI2, VOC1? At St. Andrews I saw Professor 
Heddle; he has a crystal half apatite and half vanadinite, and he 
threw out the suggestion long ago that vanadic acid is V 2 06- . . (40). 

Five days later he sent Thorpe a detailed report of his experiments on 
the oxides of vanadium and said in conclusion, “The thing above all others 
necessary for us now is to get the metal ” (40). 

Roscoe’s first paper on the subject was the Bakerian Lecture read before 
the Royal Society on December 19, 1867. On February 14, 1868, with 
Sir Edward Thorpe as his assistant, he gave a demonstration lecture at the 
Royal Institution in which he proved that the lemon-colored chloride to 
which Berzelius had assigned the formula VCI 3 actually contains oxygen. 
When the audience saw him pass the vapor from a few grams of this 
chloride, together with pure hydrogen gas, over red-hot carbon, and 
watched him test the resulting gas for carbon dioxide by passing, it into 
dear baxyta water, it was convinced that Berzelius’ formula must be 
incorrect. Roscoe proved by analysis that the lemon-colored chloride is 
an oxychloride now known as vanadyl chloride, VOClj (12), (29). 

When he began his researches on vanadium, its compounds were listed 
at £35 per ounce, and the metal itself was unknown. After all attempts at 
direct reduction of the oxides had failed, Roscoe attempted to reduce 
vanadium dichloride, VC1*, with hydrogen. Rigorous exdusion of oxygen 



Isolation of Vanadium 


203 


and moisture was necessary, and, since vanadium metal reacts violently 
with glass and porcelain, the chloride was placed in platinum boats inside 
a porcelain tube. The tube itself could not be made of platinum because 
of the porosity of that metal at red heat. 

When he heated the tube, hydrochloric acid gas came off in “torrents,” 
and continued to be evolved in decreasing quantity for from forty to eighty 
hours. When it finally 


ceased to come off, the 
tube was cooled and the 
boat was found to con- 
tain “a light whitish 
grey -colored powder, 
perfectly free from chlo- 
rine.' 1 When Roscoe ex- 
amined this powder 
under the microscope, he 
found that it reflected 
light powerfully and that 
it consisted of “a brilliant 
shining crystalline me- 
tallic mass possessing a 
bright silver- white 
lustre.” Roscoe’s paper 
announcing the isolation 
of metallic vanadium was 
read before the Royal So- 
ciety on June 16, 1869 
( 33 ). 

While studying at 
Heidelberg, Sir Edward 



Front Thorpe's “ The Right Honourable Sir Henry Enfield 

Roscoe ” 


Sir Hbnry Enfield Roscoe, 1833-1915 


Thorpe read in a French 
periodical on popular 
science that the Copley 


Professor of Chemistry at the University of Man- 
chester. Collaborator with Bunsen in researches in 
photochemistry. Author of excellent textbooks and 
treatises on pure and applied chemistry. 


Medal had been awarded 


to Sir Henry E. Roscoe. His letter of congratulation brought the follow- 
ing reply: 


In the first place let me thank you for your letter and congratula- 
tions upon the great French discovery! Many of these Parisian 
wonders have after all turned out myths — and this last is, I believe, 
no exception — the expression “Medaille de Copley' , is, so far as I am 
aware, the French (and bad French, too!) for the “Bakerian Lecture.” 
I am, however, none the less obliged to you for your good wishes on 
this occasion, and for all the valuable help which in many ways you 
gave me ( 41 ). 



202 


Discovery of the Elements 


Roscoe’s textbooks of chemistry were unusually successful, passed through 
edition after edition, and were translated into Russian, Italian, Hungarian, 
Polish, Swedish, modern Greek, Japanese, Urdu, Icelandic, Bengali, Turk- 
ish, Malayalam, and Tamil. His autobiography (42) was written with 
great charm, and the “Treatise on Chemistry” by Roscoe and Schorlemmer 
is familiar to all chemists. 

Sir Henry’s last years were spent on his beautiful estate at Woodcote in 
southern England. Here Lady Roscoe took endless pleasure in the 
cultivation of flowers and flowering shrubs and in entertaining her hus- 
band’s distinguished guests. “My father,” said Miss Roscoe, “delighted 
to bring foreigners, and the more heterogeneous they were the more he 
was pleased. I remember one luncheon party of late years, consisting 
of a Chinaman, a Japanese, a Czech, a German, and our three selves, 
and the Occidentals were much the quietest of the party” (43). 

After enjoying a serene old age, Sir Henry E. Roscoe died suddenly on 
December 18, 1915, during an attack of angina pectoris. 

In 1927 J. W. Marden and M. N. Rich of the research staff of the West- 
inghouse Lamp Company obtained metallic vanadium 99.9% pure by 
heating a mixture of vanadic oxide, metallic calcium, and calcium chloride 
in an electric furnace for an hour at a temperature of about 1400° Fahren- 
heit. When the resulting mass was cooled and stirred into cold water, 
beads of pure metallic vanadium separated out (35). 

The alloy ferrovanadium is used extensively in the steel industry. The 
presence of small amounts of vanadium profoundly alters the properties 
of steel, greatly increasing its toughness, elasticity, and tensile strength. 
Thus the metal that Sefstrom and Berzelius named for the ancient Swedish 
goddess of beauty has come to play an important utilitarian r61e in the con- 
struction of locomotive frames, driving axles, and large shaftings for 
electrical machinery. 


Literature Cited 

( 1 ) del Rio, A. M., “Analysis of an alloy of gold and rhodium from the parting house 
at Mexico,” Annals of Phil., [2], 10, 256 (Oct., 1825). 

(2) Poggbndorff, J. C., “Biographiseh-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichte 
der exakten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Articles on Hatchett, del Rio, and Sefstrom. 

(3) Hatchett, C,, “Outline of the properties and habitudes of the metallic substance 
lately discovered by Charles Hatchett, Esq., and by him denominated colum- 
biura,” Nicholson's [2], 1, 32-4 (Jan., 1802); Crell's Ann., 37, 197-201, 257- 
70, 352-64 (1802). 

(4) “New metal columbium,” Nicholson's J., 14, 181 (June, 1806). 

(5) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” Vol. 2, Colburn and Bentley, Lon- 
don, 1831, p. 231. 

(6) Wallace, O., “ Brief weehsel zwisehen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler,” Vol. 2, Verlag 
von Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig, 1901, p. 544. 



Literature Cited 


203 


(7) Balke, C. W., “Metals of the tungsten and tantalum groups,” Ind . Eng. Chem 
21 , 1002-7 (Nov., 1929); C. W. Balke and Edgar F. Smith, “Observations on 
columbium,” J. Am. Chem. Soc., 30 , 1637-68 (Nov., 1908); C. W. Balke, “The 
atomic weight of tantalum,” ibid., 32 , 1127-33 (Oct., 1910). 

(5) “American chemical industries. Fansteel Products Co., Inc.,” Ind. Eng. 
Chem., 22, 1409-12 (Dec., 1930). 

(9) “Biographical account of Mr. Ekeberg, assistant professor of chemistry at 
Upsala,” Annals of Phil., [1], 4, 241-3 (Oct., 1814); Kongl. Vetenskaps Acade- 
miens Handlingar, 1813 , p. 276. 

(10) Wollaston, W. H., “On the identity of columbium and tantalum,” Nicholson's J., 
25, 23-8 (Jan., 1810). 

(11) Rose, H. f “On a new metal, pelopium, contained in the Bavarian tantalite,” 
Phil. Mag., [3], 29 , 409-16 (Nov., 1846); Obituary of H. Rose, J. Chem . Soc., 
17, 437-40 (Proc. of Mar. 31, 1864). 

(12) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
341-5. 

(13) Soderbaum, H. G., “Jac Berzelius Bref,” Vol. 3, part 6, Almqvist and Wiksells, 
Upsala, 1912 - 1914 , pp. 18-20. 

(14) Ibid., Vol. 3, part 6, p. 25. 

(15) Ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, p. 123. 

(16) Ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, p. 40. 

(17) Giles, “Observations on niobium, tantalum, and titanium,” Chem. News, 95 , 
1-3, 37-9 (Jan. 4 and Jan. 25, 1907) ; W. von Bolton, “Das Niob, seine Darstel- 
lung und seine Eigenschaften,” Z. Elektrochem., 13, 145-9 (Apr., 1907). 

(18) “Rare Metals,” Fansteel Products Co., N. Chicago, 1929 , pp. 7-22. 

(19) Balke, C. W., “The production and uses of ductile tantalum,” Chem. Met. Eng., 
27, 1271-3 (Dec. 27, 1922). 

(20) de Marignac, J. C. G., “Recherches sur les combinaisons du niobium,” Ann. 
chim. phys., [4], 8 , 5-75 (May, 1866); “Recherches sur les combinaisons du 
tantale,” ibid., [4], 9 , 249-76 (Nov., 1866). 

(21) del Rio, A. M., “Discovery of chromium in the brown lead of zimap&n,” Gilb. 
Ann., 71 , 7. 

(22) Collet- DeSCOTILs, H.-V., “Analyse de la mine brune de plomb de Zimap&n, dans 
le royaume du Mexique, envoy£e par M. Humboldt, et dans laquelle M. del Rio 
dit avoir d^couvert un nouveau m6tal,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 53, 268-71 (1805). 

(23) Wallach, O., “Briefwechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler,” ref. (6), Vol. 1, 
p. 336. Letter of Feb. 6, 1831. 

(24) von Hofmann, A. W., “Zur Erinnerung an Friedrich Wohler,” Ber., 15 , 3170 
(Dec. 1882) ; A. W. von Hofmann and Emilie Wohler, “Justus Liebig’s und 
Friedrich Wohler’s Briefwechsel,” Vol. 1, F. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 
1888 , pp. 38-9. 

(25) SCderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref,” ref. (13), Vol. 2, part 4, pp. 98-9. 

(26) Sefstr6m, N. G., “Sur le vanadium, metal nouveau, trouv6 dans du fer en barres 
de Eckersholm, forge qui tire- sa mine de Taberg dans le Sm&land,” Ann. chim. 
phys., 46 , 105-11 (1831). 

(27) Wallach, O., “Briefwechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler,” ref. (6), Vol. 1, 
pp. 340-1. 

(28) Schuster and Shipley, “Britain’s Heritage of Science,” Constable and Co., 
London, 1917 , pp. 149-50. 

(29) Roscoe, H. E., “On vanadium, one of the trivalent group of elements,” Phil. Mag., 
[41. 35, 307-14 (Apr., 1868). 



204 Discovery of the Elements 

(30) “Alchemy in old New England/’ J. Chem. Educ., 8, 2094 (Oct., 1931); L. C. 
Newell, “Colonial chemistry. I. New England,” ibid., 2, 161-4 (Mar., 1925). 

(31) Hatchett, C.,“An analysis of the earthy substance from New South Wales, called 
sydneia, or terra australis,” Nicholson's J., 2, 72-80 (May, 1798). 

(32) Ekeberg, A. G. f “Of the properties of the earth yttria, compared with those of 
glucine; of fossils, in which the first of these earths is contained; and of the dis- 
covery of a new substance of a metallic nature (tantalium),” Nicholson's J., 3, 
.251-5 (Dec., 1802). 

(33) Roscob, H. E., “Researches on vanadium. Part II,” Phil . Mag., [4], 39, 146-50 
(Feb., 1870). 

(34) Fanstebl Products Co., Inc., “Metallic tantalum,” J. Chem. Educ., 2, 1168-9 
(Dec., 1925); W. von Bolton, “Das Tantal, seine Darstellung und seine Eigen- 
schaften,” Z. Elektrochem ., 11, 45-51 (Jan. 20, 1905). 

(.?5) “Vanadium new member of world’s metal family,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 686 
(May, 1927); J. W. Marden and M. N. Rich, “Vanadium,” Ind. Eng . Chent., 
19, 786-8 (July, 1927). 

(36) Thorpe, T. E., “The Right Honourable Sir Henry Enfield Roscoe,” Longmans, 
Green and Co., London, 1916, p. 18. 

(37) Ibid., p. 123. 

(38) Ibid., p. 26. 

(39) Ibid., pp. 38-9. 

(40) Ibid., pp. 125-30. 

(41) Ibid., p. 129. 

(42) Roscoe, H. E., “The Life and Experiences of Sir Henry Enfield Roscoe,” Mac 
millan, London, 1906. 420 pp. 

(43) Thorpe, T. E., “The Right Honourable Sir Henry Enfield Roscoe,” ref. (36), pp 
199-200. 

(44) von Humboldt, A., Gilb. Ann., 18, 118 (1804). 

(45) Wohler, F., Pogg. Ann., 21, 49 (1831). 

(46) Browne, C. A., “Some relations of early chemistry in America to medicine,” 
J. Chem. Educ., 3, 268-70 (Mar., 1926). 

(47) Waters, “A Sketch of the Life of John Winthrop the Younger, Founder of Ips- 
wich, Massachusetts, in 1633,” printed for the Ipswich Historical Soc., 1899, 
p. 76. Poem on Winthrop by B. Tompson. 

(48) Blomstrand, C. W., “Uber die Sauren der Tantalgruppe-Mineralien,” J. prakt. 
Chem., 97, 37-50 (Heft 1, 1866) ; Oefversigt af Akad. Forh., 21, 541 (1864). 

(49) Moissan, H., “Nouveau traitement de la niobite; preparation et propri£tes de la 
fonte de niobium,” Compt. rend., 133, 20-5 (July, 1901). 

(50) del Rio, A. M., “Elementos de Orictognosia,” “Elemens d’Orictognosie ou de la 
connotssance des Fossiles, disposes suivant les principes de Werner, & l'usage du 
College royal des mines du Mexique,” Imprimerie de Zuniga et Ontiveros, Mexico 
City, 1795. Review in Ann. chim . phys., [1], 21, 221-4 (Feb., 1797). 

(51) Weeks, M. E., “The scientific contributions of Don A. M. del Rio,” J. Chem. 
Educ., 12, 161-6 (Apr., 1935); “The scientific contributions of the de Elhuyar 
Brothers,” ibid., 11, 413-9 (July, 1934). 

(52) “Selections from an ancient catalogue of objects of natural history formed in New 
England more than 100 years ago by John Winthrop, F.R.S.,” Am. J. Set., [1], 
47, 282-90 (1844); C. A. Browne, “The three hundredth anniversary of chemi- 
cal industries in America,” Ind. Eng. Chem., News Ed., 12, 427-8 (Dec. 10, 1934). 

(53) Weeks, M. E., “The chemical contributions of Charles Hatchett/* J. Chem. 
Educ., IS, 153-8 (Apr., 1938) . 



Literature Cited 205 

(54) Weeks, M. E., “Nils Gabriel Sef strom. The sesquicentennial of his birth,” Isis, 
29 (1), 49-57 (July, 1938). 

(55) Anon., “Balke- Pater et filius,” Ind. Eng . Chem., News Ed., 16, 276 (May 10, 
1938). 

(56) Balke, C. W., “Columbium and tantalum,” Ind. Eng. Chem., 27, 1166-9 (Oct., 
1935). 

(57) Sodbrbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius. Levnadsteckning,” Almqvist and Wiksells 
Publishing Co., Upsala, 1929, Vol. 1, p. 141. 

(58) Heyl, P. R., “The lingering dryad,” Am. Scientist , 31, 78-87 (Jan., 1943). Cen- 
tenary of urea synthesis. 



XII. THE CHEMICAL CONTRIBUTIONS OF 
CHARLES HATCHETT 

Unlike most chemists Charles Hatchett spent all his life in luxurious 
surroundings. He was born on January 2, 1765,* the son of a famous 
coach-builder of Long Acre, London, who in 1771 built at Chelsea a man- 
sion called “Belle Vue House” (2), ( 2 ), (3). 

Most of his scientific research was done during the decade 1796 to 1806. 
His first paper in the Philosophical Transactions described his analysis of 
the Carinthian lead molybdate (4). “The celebrated Scheele,” said he, 
“in 1778 read before the Academy of Sciences at Stockholm an essay in 
which he proved . . . that the mineral called Molybdaena was composed of 
sulfur and a peculiar metallic substance, which, like arsenic and tungsten, 
was liable by super-oxygenation to be converted into a metallic acid 
which in its properties differed from any other that had been previously 
discovered.” Hatchett mentioned the confirmatory researches of B. 
Pelletier, P. J. Hjelm, and “Mr. Islmann” [J. C. Ilsemann], and added: 
“But the existence of this substance was known to be only in that mineral 
which Scheele had examined.” This lead mineral from Carinthia had been 
described by the Abb£ F. X. Wulfen and by N. J. Jacquin. For several 
years it was believed to be lead tungstate, but Klaproth proved it to be lead 
molybdate. Since Klaproth had had an insufficient amount of the mineral, 
Hatchett made a complete analysis of it and investigated the properties of 
molybdic acid. 

In the following year Hatchett was made a Fellow of the Royal Society. 
In 1798 he analyzed “an earthy substance,” sydneia y which Josiah Wedg- 
wood had found in New South Wales and another specimen of it provided 
by Sir Joseph Banks (5). This, according to Wedgwood, was composed 
of “a fine white sand, a soft white earth, some colourless micaceous parti- 
cles, and some which were black.” Hatchett found it to consist “of 
siliceous earth, alumine, oxide of iron, and black lead or graphite” and 
concluded “that the Sydneian genus, in future, must be omitted in the 
mineral system.” 

In the same year, he analyzed the water of the Mere of Diss ( 6 ). Ben- 
jamin Wiseman of Diss, Norfolk, had noticed that flint stones, calcareous 
spar, slate, and pottery left in this water from the summer of 1792 to 
August, 1795, acquired a metallic stain. He sent some of the water and 
some of the coated objects to the President and Council of the Royal So- 
ciety, who forwarded them to Charles Hatchett for analysis. Although 
the deposit contained pyrite, the water, according to Hatchett, did “not 

* Most authors state that Hatchett was born “in about 1765.” The 1935 “Annuaire” 
of the Acad&nie des Sciences, however, in its list of members and correspondents, gives 
the definite date, January 2, 1765. This annual gives the date of his death as March 10, 
1847, instead of February 10. 


206 



Charles Hatchett 


207 


hold in solution any sulphur 
and scarcely any iron; it 
has not therefore been con- 
cerned in forming the py- 
rites, but it appears to me 
that the pyritical matter is 
formed in the mud and filth 
of the Mere; for Mr. Wise- 
man says . . . that ‘the 
Mere has received the silt 
of the streets for ages.’ 

Now . . . sulphur is con- 
tinually formed, or rather 
liberated, from putrefying 
animal and vegetable mat- 
ter, . . . and this most prob- 
ably has been the case at 
Diss. . .” 

In the following year Sir 
Everard Home interested 
Mr. Hatchett in the chemi- 
cal composition of dental 
enamel (7), ( 8 ). Since the 
tooth of the elephant is 
composed of three different 
structures, Sir Everard Dedication page from Brande . s « Manual of 
wished to know “whether Chemistry,” Third Edition, London, 1830. 
the materials themselves 

were different or only differently arranged.” Hatchett showed that the 
enamel was composed of calcium phosphate. “The enamel,” said he, 
“has been supposed not a phosphate but a carbonate of lime. This error 
may have arisen from its solubility in acetous acid or distilled vinegar; 
but the effects of the acetous acid are in every respect the same on pow- 
dered bone as on the enamel” ( 8 ). 

Hatchett then investigated the composition of shell and bone. “When it 
is applied to the cuttle-bone of the shops. . said he, “the term bone is 
here misapplied. . . for this substance in composition is exactly similar to 
shell, and consists of various membranes hardened by carbonate of lime, 
without the smallest mixture of phosphate” (< 8 ). 

Mr. Hatchett observed that the external skeleton of crustaceans and the 
egg shells of birds contain more calcium carbonate than calcium phosphate 
but that in bones the phosphate predominates . “It is possible,” said he, 

. . that some bones may be found composed only of phosphate of lime; 




208 


Discovery of the Elements 


and that thus shells containing only carbonate of lime and bones containing 
only phosphate of lime will form the two extremities in the chain. . 

In 1800 he published a paper which won the approbation and interest of 
Sir Humphry Davy (9), (10). “Mr. Hatchett/ 1 said he, “has noticed in 
his excellent paper on zoophytes that isinglass is almost wholly composed of 
gelatine. I have found that 100 grains of good and dry isinglass contain 
more than 98 grains of matter soluble in water . . .” Dr. John Bostock 
(1774-1846) also praised this paper. “The term mucus/ 7 said he, “had 

been generally employed in a vague 
and unrestricted sense until Mr. Hat- 
chett . . . attempted to assign to it a 
more appropriate and definite mean- 
ing. He conceives that jelly and 
mucus are only modifications of the 
same substance ... he considers it to 
be entitled to the appellation of mucus 
when it is soluble in cold water and 
cannot be brought to a gelatinous 
state . . . the ideas which I have 
•formed of the nature of jelly and 
mucus . . . differ materially from those 
of Mr. Hatchett . . . Mr. Hatchett . . . 
speaks of the white of the egg as con- 
sisting of pure albumen, but I believe 
that in this particular he will be found 
not perfectly accurate. . .” Dr. Bo- 
stock had found it to contain also a 
William Thomas Brande small amountof a substance incapable 

of coagulation (11). 

British chemist and mineralogist. Sue <Znnn ^ftor tu* + 1irT1 n f tu*. o#»ntnrv 
cessor to Sir Humphry Davy at the Royal fe00n atter tUm 0t century, 

Institution. Son-in-law of Charles Hat- Mr. Hatchett became interested in 

wiui *» Th »”“ * **** 
chemistry. apothecaries’ apprentice who had re- 



Lecturer on mmeralogical 


chemistry. apothecaries’ apprentice who had re- 

cently moved to Chiswick. He en- 
couraged the boy to collect and classify ores and rocks, and presented him 
with some of his duplicate specimens; the boy, in turn, sometimes assisted 
Mr. Hatchett in analyzing minerals (1). Brande’s first scientific paper was 
published in Nicholson’s Journal when he was only sixteen years old. 
When he became Sir Humphry Davy’s successor at the Royal Institution, 
Brande increased the mineral collection and used it in his lectures. He 
later married Charles Hatchett’s daughter. 

Hatchett’s greatest achievement was probably his discovery of the metal 
columbium (12). While he was arranging some minerals at the British 



COLUMBITE 


209 


Museum, one of them attracted his attention. From Sir Hans Sloane's 
catalogue he found that it had been sent by “Mr. Winthrop of Massachu- 
setts.” 

Early accounts of the discovery of columbite differ in several important 
respects. While examining some min- 
erals in the British Museum, half a 
century after the death of its founder, 

Sir Hans Sloane, Charles Hatchett 
became interested in a small, dark, 
heavy specimen which bore some re- 
semblance to the “Siberian chromate 
of iron” on which he was then making 
some experiments. 

“Upon referring to Sir Hans Sloane’s 
catalogue,” said Hatchett before 
the Royal Society on November 26, 

1801 , “I found that this specimen was 
only described as ‘a very heavy black 
stone, with golden streaks’ which 
proved to be yellow mica; and it ap- 
peared that it had been sent with vari- 
ous specimens of iron ores to Sir Hans 
Sloane by Mr. Winthrop of Massa- 
chusetts. The name of the mine, or 
place where it was found, is also noted 
in the catalogue ; the writing, however, 
is scarcely legible: it appears to be 
an Indian name (Nautneague) ; but 
I am informed by several American 

, Printed by C. Hullmandel 

gentlemen that many of the Indian From T. Faulkner's " Historical and topographical 
... , . , . description of Chelsea" 1829 

names (by which certain small dis- 0 ^ 

' ; „ _ Sir Hans Sloane 

tncts, hills, etc., were forty or fifty 1660-1753 

years ago distinguished) are now British physician and collector. 

totally forgotten, and European Mtaf °[ th t e Philosophical Transactions. 

; * * . . . r President of the Royal Society. The 

names have been adopted m the room books, pictures, coins, and specimens 

of them. This may have been the ™ hich bequeathed to the nation 
. . became the nucleus of the British Museum, 

case m the present instance; but, as The specimen of columbite in which 
the other specimens sent by Mr. Hatch^di^overed columbium was from 

Winthrop were from the mines of 

Massachusetts, there is every reason to believe that the mineral sub- 
stance in question came from one of them, although it may not now be 
easy to identify the particular mine” {12). 

In the following January, Nicholson's Journal stated that “the mineral 




210 


Discovery of the Elements 


was sent with some iron ores to Sir Hans Sloane by Mr. Winthrop of Massa- 
chusetts [sic], and there is therefore every reason to believe that it came 
from some of the iron mines in that province [sic]” (12). 

In the fall of the same year, the Medical Repository made a preliminary 
announcement of Hatchett’s discovery of “a metal in an ore lately brought 
from North-America .... We have no particular information from what 
spot or region the mineral was procured” (36). 

After reading Hatchett’s paper in the Philosophical Transactions (12), 
Samuel Latham Mitchill, editor, published an abstract of it in his Medical 
Repository (36). In commenting on the name “Nautneague” he said, 
“From the same place, it is probable, more of the like ore can be obtained. 
This is particularly desirable, as Mr. Hatchett has had so small a piece to 
work upon, and no other specimen but the half which he reserved for the 
museum is known to exist. We hope the gentlemen of Massachusetts, 
who respect Mr. Winthrop’s memory and are acquainted with the scope 
and direction of his researches, will find out the mine and procure more 
samples of this singular mineral. We think this matter would not be un- 
worthy of that excellent institution the Historical Society” (36). 

“No complete disoxydation of it,” continued Mitchill, “has as yet been 
effected. The pure metal, therefore, has not been seen, even by Mr. 
Hatchett himself. And if this discerning experimenter had succeeded in 
freeing the metal from its oxygen, the quantity he worked upon was so 
very small that it would have been impossible to have gratified many of 
the curious by presents. At this time it is not known what quantity may 
exist in nature, nor to what economical uses it may be applied. 

“While we express our hopes that the whole history of this Columbian 
mineral will soon be made known, we sincerely deplore the afflicting and 
untimely death of our friend and countryman, Mr. Thomas P. Smith, from 
whose industry, acuteness, and zeal in chemical (and, indeed, almost the 
whole circle of physical) researches, Mr. Hatchett informs the Royal So- 
ciety he had anticipated important aid in this inquiry” (36). 

In his annual oration before the Chemical Society of Philadelphia in 
1798, this youthful chemist voiced his conviction that “The only true bases 
on which the Independence of our country can rest are Agriculture and 
Manufactures . To the promotion of these nothing tends in a higher degree 
than Chemistry .... It is to a general diffusion of a knowledge of this 
science, next to the Virtue of our countrymen, that we are to look for the 
firm establishment of our Independence ” (47). In the return journey from 
England, Thomas P. Smith died “in consequence of the bursting of a gun” 
at the age of only twenty-five years (36). Mrs, Gertrude D, Hess, assistant 
librarian, kindly searched the manuscripts of the American Philosophical 
Society by and pertaining to Thomas P* Smith, but was unable to find 
there any mention oi columbite. 



COLUMBITE 


211 


In the spring of 1805 the Medical Repository published an article entitled 
“Place where the ore of columbium was found” (37). “It has been ascer- 
tained,” the article stated, “that the specimen of this metal [sic] upon 
which the experiments were made, as mentioned in our Med . Rep . Hex. i, 
vol. vi., p. 322, was taken from a spring of water in the town of New London, 
in the State of Connecticut. The fountain is near the house in which Gover- 
nor Winthrop used to live, and is about three miles distant from the margin 
of salt water, at the head of the harbour. This is the spot heretofore called 
Nautneague; which is in Connecticut and not in Massachusetts. By the 
politeness of Francis B. Winthrop, Esq., of New York, the manuscript 
papers of his ancestor, relative to this place and to the minerals he carried 
to Hans Sloane, have been sent to the Historical Society of Massachusetts. 
By their care, we hope, every interesting particular concerning this sub- 
stance and the place where it was orginally found will be made known to 
the public. It will then be easy for gentlemen to visit the spot and to col- 
lect other specimens of this singular ore” (37). 

In the same year A.-L. Millin published in his Magasin Encyclopgdique 
what seems to be a rather inaccurate French translation of the preceding 
article. He said he had obtained the information from M. Valentin, a 
physician and skilful physicist and naturalist of Marseilles (38). 

The “Mr. Winthrop of Massachusetts” referred to by Charles Hatchett 
was John Winthrop (1681-1747), grandson of the first governor of Con- 
necticut and great grandson of the first governor of Massachusetts. He 
was a Fellow and very active member of the Royal Society. Like his pa- 
ternal grandfather, who had been one of the original Fellows of this So- 
ciety, he liked to collect natural objects. The Journal Book of the Royal 
Society for June 27, 1734, stated that “Mr. Winthrop presented several 

curiosities from New England, as contained in the following list These 

curiosities are a part of a large collection shewn at several meetings during 
the subsequent winter, and the whole catalogue to which these numbers 
refer is entered after the minutes of the day” (39). Sir Hans Sloane was 
then President of the Royal Society (40). 

In 1844 Benjamin Silliman and Benjamin Silliman, Jr., published this 
historic list in their American Journal of Science and remarked in a foot- 
note that “it has been supposed that the original specimen on which Mr. 
Hatchett made the discovery of columbic acid was sent in this invoice, and 
that some hint as to the locality from whence it came might be had” ( 39 ). 
The only entry the Sillimans could find in this list, however, that corre- 
sponded at all with Hatchett’s description of columbite was “No. 348. 
A black mineral, very heavy, from the inland parts of the country.” They 
concluded that “we must therefore rest content probably in ignorance of 
the exact locality of that interesting specimen, although mineralogists 



212 Discovery of the Elements 

have, on what evidence does not appear, considered New London as the 
locality ,, (39). 

Berzelius even doubted the American origin of columbite. In a letter 
to Thomas Thomson in the autumn of 1814 (see page 191), he stated that 
“Mr. Hatchett gave this name after the place where it was thought the 
fossil had been found; now it is not good practice to name elementary sub- 
stances in chemistry after the places where they have first been found ; not 
to mention the fact that the place where columbite was found is still 
doubtful, in the same degree as it is not certain that it comes from Amer- 
ica. 

In his Report on the Geological Survey of the State of Connecticut , Dr. 
Charles Upham Shepard said of columbite: “The State of Connecticut 
furnished the first sample of this ore to science .... The chinastone quarry 
at Middletown has furnished the most extraordinary specimens of colum- 
bite yet described in the world. A single group of crystals obtained at this 
place weighed fourteen pounds .... It is also found in small quantity at 
Haddam .... The first sample was sent by Governor Winthrop to Sir 
Hans Sloane, and was deposited with the collection of the gentleman in 
the British Museum, where it was examined by Mr. Hatchett, and after- 
wards by Dr. Wollaston. The specimen was supposed to have been found 
near New London, which was the residence of Governor Winthrop; but 
as the ore has not been rediscovered in that vicinity, it is more probable 
that it was obtained from the region of Middletown” (41). 

Since Sir Hans Sloane was only sixteen years old when Governor Win- 
throp died, Shepard’s statement that the columbite had been sent to Sloane 
by Governor Winthrop is probably erroneous. Hatchett’s remark in 1801 
that many Indian names (such as Nautneague) which were used “forty or 
fifty years ago . . . are now totally forgotten” implies that he understood 
that the original specimen of columbite must have been labeled in about the 
middle of the eighteenth century (12). He referred to the sender, more- 
over, not as “Governor” Winthrop but as “Mr.” Winthrop. 

In his “Chemistry in Old Philadelphia” Edgar F. Smith stated that 
“Hatchett found ... a new element in a mineral of the Royal Society Col- 
lection which had been sent in from Haddam, Connecticut, and been called 
there columbite by Governor Winthrop” (42). 

In an article on the life and mineral collection of Sir Hans Sloane, Jessie 
M. Sweet states that “The only specimen which fortunately is still in the 
Mineral Collection is the original fragment of columbite (B. M. 60309), of 
which a brief account may be given here. Sloane describes it in the cata- 
logue of “Metalls,” No. 2029, as: A very heavy black stone with golden 
streaks . . . from Nautneague. From Mr. Winthrop” (40). 

Miss Sweet adds that when John Winthrop (1681-1747) was elected a 
Fellow of the Royal Society in 1734, “he presented more than six hundred ' 



COLUMBITE 


213 


specimens (mostly minerals), together with a manuscript catalogue of 
them to the Society .... Many of these specimens appear to have been 
incorporated into the Sloane collection, as several entries in the Winthrop 
and Sloane manuscript catalogues are identical, and the columbite prob- 
ably came from Winthrop at that time” (40). 

Miss Sweet also stated 
that “it was surmised that 
‘Nautneague’ was another 
name for Naumeaug (now 
NewLondon, Connecticut) , 
and the specimen was be- 
lieved to have been found 
in a spring of water, near 
the house of Governor 
Winthrop .... The co- 
lumbite is figured and de- 
scribed in James Sowerby’s 
Exotic Mineralogy, 1811- 
1 820, vol. 1 , p. 1 1 and plate 
6, and compares favour- 
ably with Sloane’ s descrip- 
tion, but now the specimen 
has no longer any ‘golden 
streaks’ ” (40). 

In 1940 Dr. C. A. Browne 
wrote Mr. Allyn B. Forbes 
of the Massachusetts His- 
torical Society for infor- 
mation regarding the 

manuscript paper which CourUsy MassackuseUs Historical Society 

Francis B. Winthrop of J °7m-l74*° P 

New York is said to have The specimen of columbite which Hatchett an- 
sent to this Society. Ac- alyzed had been sent to the Royal Society by this 
at* z. / j John Winthrop, a grandson of John Winthrop, first 
cording to SStCnOlSOn S governor of Connecticut. This portrait was repro- 
Journal for 1806 this duced from a copy in the collections of the Massa- 
. . r “ chusetts Historical Society. Volume 40 (1737-38) 

manuscript referred to the 0 f the Philosophical Transactions was dedicated to 
mineral which F. B. Win- kim by Cromwell Mortimer, Secretary of the Royal 

throp’s “ancestor” had Society - 

given Sir Hans Sloane and to the place where it was found (43). However, 
no trace of such a document could be found. Francis B. Winthrop (1754- 
1817) was a grandson of John Winthrop (1681-1747) and great-great- 
grandson of the first governor of Connecticut (44). 

The Massachusetts Historical Society has preserved a commonplace 




214 


Discovery of the Elements 


book which originally belonged to John Winthrop (1681-1747). In it there 
is a letter which Francis B. Winthrop wrote to his brother Thomas L. 
Winthrop of Boston on September 10, 1803, describing the spring At New 
London in connection with their grandfather. ‘T think you must re- 
member this spring,” said he, “It is about three miles from the sea, which 
answers to the distance in the memo of articles presented to the Royal 
Society” (45). 

DEDICATION. 

ment as well as worthy Member, and 
of their learned and moft eminent Pre- 
sident the Honourable Sir Ham Sloane 
Baronet : Your perfonal Acquaintance 
with our ingenious Latin Author Dr. 
Cramer y who cannot but greatly ap- 
prove of my dedicating to you a Trans- 
lation of his excellent Book on the doci- 
maftic Art ; thefe, Sir, have been the 
Motives, for which 1 could not more 
juftly, nor more judicioufly fhelter this 
my new Performance under any other 
Name, than yours. 

However, Sir, 1 fliall always take it 
as a Angular Favour done me, if you 
will be pleafed to accept this Tender of 
my Refpetd, as a Teftimony of the vafl: 
Efteem and Ancerc Friendfliip, where- 
with 1 have the Honour to be, 

SIR , 

Tour trnfl obedient t 

And mjl bumble Serjant, 

London, 

3> iz^- 

Dedication of the English translation of J. A. Cramer's “Elements of the Art of 
Assaying Metals/ 1 London, 1741. It refers to John Winthrop ( 1681 - 1747 ), grandson 
of the first governor of Connecticut. 

In the letters of Governor John Winthrop the Younger, published with 
the Winthrop Papers of the Massachusetts Historical Collections, there is 
no mention of columbite. His interest in minerals, despite the difficulty 
of collecting them, is expressed, however, in a letter to Sir Robert Moray 
on August 18, 1668. ”1 have been very inquisitive,” wrote the Governor, 
4 'after all sorts of mineralls, w* h this wildernesse may probably affoard; 
but indeed the constant warrs, w ch have continued amongst the Indians 
since I came last over, hath hindred all progresse in searching out such 
matters . . * * Those shewes of minerals, w cix we have frd the Indians doe 


To the Honourable 

JOHN WINTHROP E% 

Fellow of the Roval Societv. 

S 1 R, 

I Beg Leave to make this Addrcfs to 
you in ConAdcration of thofe ex- 
cellent Virtues and rare Accomplifh- 
ments, with which you arc endowed 
both as a Gentleman and a Scholar, 
Your great Knowledge of the true and 
mod fecret Branches of Philofophy, 
which has been for many Generations 
handed down in your honourable Fa- 
mily ; your profound Skill in all mi- 
neral Affairs, particularly in Metallurgy, 
which you have likewife inherited from 
your noble and truly learned Anceftors, 
of which you have given ample Proofi 
by thofe curious Collections oi American 
Minerals; wherewith you have enriched 
the Mf earns both of the Royal Society % 
of which you arc an illuftrious Oma- 
A ment 



COLUMBIUM 


215 


only demonstrate that such are in reality in the country, but they usually 
bring but small pieces, w ch are found accidentally in their huntings, stick- 
ing in some rock or on the surface of the earth, on the side of some hill, or 
banke of a river . . .” {46). 

From the existing evidence, it seems impossible to prove conclusively 
whether columbite was discovered by John Winthrop the Younger, first 
governor of Connecticut, and bequeathed to his grandson, John Winthrop 
(1681-1747), or whether it was originally discovered by the grandson. It 
is possible, however, that this question may some day be settled by the 
finding of hitherto unknown documents. 

Hatchett fused the ore with potassium carbonate. When he took up 
the melt with boiling water, a brown residue remained. When nitric acid 
was added to the yellow filtrate, a copious white precipitate was thrown 
down. “The preceding experiments shew,” said he, “that the ore which 
has been analyzed consists of iron combined with an unknown substance 
and that the latter constitutes more than three fourths of the whole. 
This substance is proved to be of a metallic nature by the coloured precipi- 
tates which it forms with prussiate of potash and with tincture of galls; 
by the effects which zinc produces when immersed in the acid solutions; 
and by the colour which it communicates ... to concrete phosphoric acid, 
when melted with it. . .” He mentioned that it retained oxygen tenaciously 
and that the oxide was acidic. Although the specimen Hatchett analyzed 
was very small, he hoped to get more soon from “a gentleman now in 
England (Mr. Smith, Secretary to the American Philosophical Society).” 
This was evidently Thomas P. Smith, who died in 1802. In his “Chemistry 
in America,” Dr. Edgar Fahs Smith quotes from the National Intelligencer , 
“While we express our hopes that the whole history of this Columbian 
mineral will soon be made known, we sincerely deplore the afflicting and 
untimely death of our friend and countryman, Mr. Thomas P. Smith, from 
whose industry, acuteness and zeal in chemical . . . researches, Mr. Hatchett 
informs the Royal Society he had anticipated important aid in this in- 
quiry.” 

Hatchett named the new metal columbium and stated that its “olive 
green prussiate and the orange-coloured gallate . . . may probably be em- 
ployed with advantage as pigments.” He also described his unsuccessful 
attempts to reduce the oxide to the metal. From his careful use of La- 
voisier's new nomenclature, it is evident that Hatchett Was not a phlogistonist. 

In 1798 the Committee of Privy Council for considering the state of the 
coinage reported that the gold coin was suffering considerable losses in 
weight, and requested Henry Cavendish and Charles Hatchett to examine 
it “to ascertain whether this loss was occasioned by any defect” (13). 
Their experiments were begun near the end of 1798 and completed in 
April, 1801. At Cavendish's request the report was made by Hatchett 



216 


Discovery of the Elements 


alone. Hatchett stated, however, . . At all times I was favoured with his 
valuable “advice; and the machines to produce friction, as well as the dies 
were entirely contrived by himself. . .” 

Hatchett studied the binary alloys of gold with arsenic, antimony, zinc, 
cobalt, nickel, manganese, bismuth, lead, tin, iron, platinum, copper, and 
silver, and confirmed the prevailing opinion that of these metals only copper 
and silver are suitable for alloying gold for coinage. He concluded “that 
gold made standard by silver and copper is rather to be preferred for 
coin, . .” and added that “there is commonly some silver in the gold which is 
sent to the Mint.” He also stated, not without humor, that “our gold 
coin suffers but little by friction against itself; and the chief cause of 



(Phil Trans., 1803) 

Apparatus designed by Henry Cavendish and used by 
Charles Hatchett for determining the comparative wear of 
gold when alloyed by various metals. Two frames, one above 
the other, each carrying twenty-eight coins, rubbed the upper 
coins backward and forward over the ones below. Each of 
the smaller concentric circles represents a coin. To avoid 
the formation of furrows, the direction in which the coins 
rubbed against each other was made to vary continually. 


natural and fair wear probably arises from extraneous and gritty particles; 

. . . the united effect of every species of friction to which they may be sub- 
jected, fairly and unavoidably , during circulation. . . will by no means ac- 
count for the great and rapid diminution which has been observed in the gold 
coin of this country . . He added that the study of alloys had 
not kept pace with the rapid progress of chemistry and that “Few additions 
have been made to the compound metals employed by the ancients.” 

In 1804 he published an analysis of a “triple sulphuret of lead, antimony, 
and copper,” James Smithson (1765-1829), founder of the Smithsonian 
Institution, disagreed with his conclusions. “It is not probable,” said he, 
“that the present ore is a direct quadruple combination of the three metals. 



Charles Hatchett 


217 


and sulphur and that these, in their simple states, are its immediate com- 
ponent parts; it is much more credible that it is a combination of the three 
sulphurets of these metals. . .” (14), (15). 

At the same time Hatchett became interested in lac (16). Geoffroy the 
Younger and J. A. C. Chaptal had regarded it as a kind of wax, but F. C. 
Gren and A.-F. Fourcroy believed it to be a true resin. Hatchett con- 
cluded “that although lac is indisputably the production of insects, yet . . . 
the greater part of its aggregate properties, as well as of its component in- 
gredients, are such as more immediately appertain to vegetable bodies . . .” 

In 1804 he analyzed a strongly magnetic specimen of pyrite (17) to de- 
termine whether the magnetic polarity was inherent in the iron sulfide or 
whether minute particles of “the ordinary magnetical iron ore” [magnetite] 
were interspersed in it. Although he could find no previous mention of 
magnetic iron sulfide, Hatchett proved experimentally “that the three in- 
flammable substances, carbon, sulphur, and phosphorus . . . possess the 
property of enabling iron to retain the power of magnetism ...” 

He continued the study of bitumens which he had begun in 1798 and 
strengthened the evidence “that bituminous substances are derived from 
the organized kingdoms of nature, and especially from vegetable bodies.” 
He analyzed a “schistus” (IS) which Sir Joseph Banks had found near a 
geyser near Reykum, Iceland, and found it to consist of water, oily bitu- 
men, mixed gas, charcoal, silica, oxide of iron, and alumina. 

When Sir James Hall (1761-1832) read of this work, he recalled his own 
experiments on “the effects of compression in modifying the effects of 
heat,” and concluded that “the changes which, with true scientific modesty, 
he [Hatchett] ascribes to an unknown cause, may have resulted from vari- 
ous heats acting under pressure of various force” (19). Sir James sub- 
jected the theories of the geologists to the test of chemical experiment and 
showed that when limestone is heated under pressure, it is not converted 
into quicklime but into crystalline marble. 

After analyzing some specimens from a pitch lake of Trinidad, Hatchett 
concluded that “a considerable part of the aggregate mass at Trinidad 
was not pure mineral pitch or asphaltum, but rather a porous stone of the 
argillaceous genus, much impregnated with bitumen. The specimens he 
analyzed, however, were not representative of the lake as a whole” (20). 

In 1804 William Nicholson, the editor, chose Mr. Hatchett and Edward 
Howard to serve with him on a committee to judge Richard Chenevix’s 
alloy of platinum and mercury which Chenevix believed identical with 
palladium, the new metal which had been announced anonymously by 
W. H. Wollaston. Hatchett saw with his own eyes some of the experi- 
ments made by the enthusiastic but misguided Chenevix. 

During the years 1805 and 1806 Hatchett published three papers on 
an artificial tanning agent (21). He mentioned the researches of Nicolas 



218 


Discovery of the Elements 


Deyeux (1745-1837), Armand Seguin (1767-1835), and Sir Humphry 
Davy on the natural tanning agents, and added that R. Chenevix had 

‘‘observed that a decoction of coffee-berries 



Revue Illuslree, 1886 
Sketch by P Renouard. 


did not precipitate gelatine unless they had 
been previously roasted ; so that tannin had 
in this case either been formed or had been 
developed from the other vegetable princi- 
ples by the effects of heat.” 

Hatchett treated various kinds of wood, 
coal, and coke with nitric acid and found 
that “a substance very analogous to tannin 
. . . may at any time be produced by exposing 
carbonaceous substances, whether vegetable, 
animal, or mineral, to the action of nitric 
acid.” He also “converted skin into leather 
by means of materials which, to professional 
men, must appear extraordinary, such as 
deal sawdust, asphaltum, common turpen- 
tine, pit coal, wax candle, and a piece of the 
same sort of skin ...” 

Dr. John Bostock tried unsuccessfully to 
use Hatchetts artificial tan as a test for 
“jelly” [gelatine]. Although it had been 
stated “on the highest authority, that of Mr. 
Hatchett and Mr. Davy . . . that isinglass 
consists of nearly pure jelly,” Dr. Bostock 
found that isinglass from the shops contained 


Michel-Eug6nb Chevreul 
1786-1889 

French chemist and psycholo- 
gist who made notable contribu- 
tions to the chemistry of fats 
and oils, soap, candles, and dyes. 
He lived to be almost one hun- 
dred and three years old, sound 
and active in mind and body. 
This sketch was made at his 
centenary, a gala occasion in 
Paris. When he investigated 
Hatchett's artificial tanning 
agents, Chevreul was only 
twenty-four years old (twenty- 
one years younger than Hatch- 
ett). See ref. (48). 


a certain amount of insoluble matter which 
he believed to be coagulated albumen. Dr. 
G. Melandri of Milan also investigated 
Hatchett’s tannin. 

M.-E. Chevreul, near the beginning of his 
surprisingly long career, studied Hatchett’s 
papers and prepared some of the “tannin.” 
Hatchett had found that pit-coal which con- 
tained no resinous substance was dissolved 
completely by nitric acid and converted into 
the artificial tannin, whereas any resinous 
matter remained undissolved. When Chev- 


reul treated pit-coal with nitric acid, how- 
ever, evaporated the solution, and poured it into water, “a yellow matter 
separated, which was much more abundant than what remained in solu- 
tion, and had no property that rendered it similar to resins ... yet I db 



Hatchett and His Friends 


219 


not allow myself,” said Chevreul, “the least reflection on the labours of that 
celebrated English chemist, as I am too fully aware that different modes 
of operating and the different varieties of the bodies examined . . . may pro- 
duce a variation in the results . . .” Chevreul found that the water-soluble 
substance which precipitated gelatine copiously was a compound of nitric 
acid and carbonaceous matter ...” (22). These artificial tannins have 
since been identified as picric acid and other nitro derivatives of phenols (23). 

Thomas Thomson said in 1810, “Till lately the analysis of vegetable sub- 
stances was almost entirely overlooked by British chemists; but the fine- 
ness of the field has now begun to attract their attention. Experiments of 
great importance have been published by Davy, Chenevix &c and above 
all by Hatchett ...” (24). 

On February 21, 1809, Hatchett became a member of the famous Liter- 
ary Club which had been founded in 1764 by Dr. Samuel Johnson and Sir 
Joshua Reynolds. As treasurer of the club, Hatchett prepared a brief 
historical account of it, which appears in Boswell’s “Life of Johnson” 
(25). The club also included, among others, Edmund Burke, Oliver Gold- 
smith, David Garrick, Edward Gibbon, Adam Smith, Sir Joseph Banks, 
Sir Charles Blagden, Sir Humphry Davy, Dr. W. H. Wollaston, Sir Walter 
Scott, Sir Thomas Lawrence, and Dr. Thomas Young. 

Hatchett also took an active part in the Animal Chemistry Club , which 
met alternately at his home and that of Sir Everard Home. Once every 
three months, Sir Benjamin Brodie, Sir Humphry Davy, W. T. Brande, 
Mr. John George Children, and a few others dined with the two hosts and 
discussed their researches in physiological chemistry (26), (27), (28). 
According to Sir Benjamin Brodie, “they were very rational meetings, in 
which a good deal of scientific discussion was mixed up with lively and 
agreeable conversation. The society continued to exist for ten or eleven 
years, but during the latter part of the time, some other members were 
added to it, and it degenerated into a mere dinner club . . . Hatchett, who 
had now inherited a considerable fortune on the death of his father, had 
ceased to work in chemistry (in spite of the remonstrance of Sir Joseph 
Banks, who used to say to him in his rough way that ‘he would find being a 
gentleman of fortune was a confounded bad trade’), but he had previously 
laid up a large store of knowledge, abounded in the materials of conversa- 
tion, and was a delightful companion . . (28). 

Hatchett was one of the “educated men, with the sagacity for which this 
nation is famous” who helped to entertain Berzelius in 18X2 (29). Since 
Berzelius understood little of what the English chemists were saying, he had 
a dull time at Hatchett’s dinner party. It was there, nevertheless, that 
he first made the acquaintance of Dr. Alexander Marcet. 

In his travel diary Berzelius wrote, “Hatchett himself is a very agreeable 
man of about forty to forty-five years. His father was a rich coach-maker, 



220 Discovery of the Elements 

and the son, although a famous chemist at the time of his father’s death, 
has continued to carry on the business. He is in very good circumstances, 
and lives in Roehampton on a little estate built in a fine Italian style and 
excellently maintained . . . Close by his Italian villa he has a very well- 
equipped laboratory, but for a long time he has not worked” (30). 

When the English translation of Berzelius’ treatise on the composition of 
animal fluids appeared, Dr. Marcet wrote, “Your great memoir is an honour 
to us. Hatchett, however, complains that, when you hunted in his 

grounds, you didn’t even 
cite him; but I have ex- 
plained to him, as best I 
could, the haste in which 
you found yourself and your 
necessity of abstaining from 
reference work.” 

‘ ‘ I am very sorry, ’ ’ replied 
Berzelius, “. . . . but if you 
take this matter up with 
him again, tell him that I 
am absolutely ignorant of 
any work of his on these 
subjects other than that of 
the testaceae. . Berzelius 
also explained that he had 
confined himself almost en- 
tirely to a description of his 
own work. Dr. Marcet re- 
plied, “I gave your little 
compliment to Hatchett, 
who seemed entirely satis- 
fied with it, and sends you 
his best regards. You will 
see on consulting Thomson 
[Thomas Thomson, “A sys- 
tem of chemistry,” 1810] that he has written more than once on animal 
substances” (29). 

In 1813 Hatchett published in the Annals of Philosophy a method of 
separating iron and manganese (31). This paper was in the form of a letter 
to Thomas Thomson, the editor, and was dated “Mount Clare, Roehamp- 
ton, Sept, 25, 1813.” A. F. Gehlen had used succinic acid to separate 
these two metals, Professor J. F. John had used oxalic acid, but Hatchett 
simply precipitated the ferric hydroxide from a neutral solution containing 
ammonium chloride, leaving the manganese in solution. 



Charles Hatchett 

This portrait was lithographed by Day and 
Haghe from the painting by Thomas Phillips, and 
published in 1836 by Thomas McLean. 



Charles Hatchett 


221 


In 1817 he described a method of renovating musty “com” [wheat] by 
floating off the damaged grain with boiling water and carefully drying the 
rest (32). 

In his history of Chelsea (33), Thomas Faulkner has left a contemporary’ 
description of Hatchett’s fine home, Belle Vue House. “This capital 
mansion,” says Faulkner, “was built by Mr. Hatchett’s father in 1771 ; and 
the weeping willow opposite to the house, reckoned one of the finest trees of 
its kind in England, was planted by him in 1776; it commands beautiful 
views of the Thames and the distant Surrey Hills.” In the house were 
paintings by several great masters, a portrait of Mrs. Hatchett by Gains- 
borough, a large organ, a collection of manuscript and printed music, and 
some Mongol idols collected by Hatchett’s friend Peter Simon Pallas, the 
famous traveler. “The Library,” said Faulkner, “is extensive, and con- 
tains many valuable editions of the Greek and Latin Classics, together with 
a numerous series of Historical Works, and the voluminous Transactions 
and Memoirs of the Royal Society and other similar learned Institutions of 
Europe.” 

In December, 1818, Dr. Marcet wrote to Berzelius, “Wollaston, [Sir 
William] Congreve, and Hatchett are hard at work, but up to the present 
haven’t produced anything.” Three years later he wrote: “Hatchett is 
taking care of his money and paying court to personages with grand titles ; 
but is no longer doing anything in chemistry, and I do not even know that 
he is showing much interest in what others are doing” (29). He must have 
retained some interest, however, for on September 15, 1823, he was elected 
as a correspondent for the chemical section of the Acad&mie des Sciences . 
In 1836 Hatchett published a quarto brochure on “The spikenard of the 
ancients.” He died at his home, Belle Vue House, Chelsea, on February 
10, 1847, at the age of eighty- two years. 

In 1821 the Reverend J. J. Conybeare (1779-1824) named an Australian 
mineral in honor of “the eminent chemist to whom we are indebted for the 
most valuable contributions towards the history and analysis of this class 
of mineral substances”; this form of mineral tallow is still known as 
hatchettine or hatchettite. He found later, however, that it was identical 
with the substance W. T. Brande had referred to as mineral adipocere (34). 

In 1877 the American mineralogical chemist J. Lawrence Smith named 
a mineral from North Carolina, a columbate of uranium, hatchettolite, be- 
cause Hatchett’s discovery of columbium “was clear, precise, and well 
made out, and has never been controverted” (35). 

The author wishes to thank Dr. C. A. Browne and Mr. Allyn B. Forbes 
for kindly placing at her disposal their correspondence on the history of 4 
columbite, and Mrs. Gertrude D. Hess for examining the papers which 
Thomas P, Smith bequeathed to the American Philosophical Society. 



222 


Discovery of the Elements 

Literature Cited 


(1) Stephen, Leslie and Sidney Lee, “Dictionary of National Biography," Smith, 
Elder and Co„ London, 1891, Vol. 25, p. 153. Article on Hatchett by Gordon 
Goodwin. 

( 2 ) Anonymous obituary of Charles Hatchett, Gentlemen's Mag., n. s., 28, 214-5 
(Aug., 1847). 

(3) Faulkner, Thomas, “A Historical and Topographical Description of Chelsea and 
Its Environs," T. Faulkner, Chelsea, 1829, Vol. 1, pp. 89-92. 

(4) Hatchett, Charles, “An analysis of the Carinthian molybdate of lead. . .,” Phil. 
Trans., 86, 285-339 (1796). 

(5) Hatchett, Charles, “An analysis of the earthy substance from New South 
Wales, called sydneia, or terra australis,” ibid., 88, 110-29 (1798); Nicholson's 
J. t 2, 72-80 (May, 1798). 

(6) Hatchett, Charles, “Analysis of the water of the Mere of Diss,” Phil. Trans., 
88, 572-81 (1798); Nicholson's J., 3, 80-4 (May, 1799). 

(7) Home, Sir Everard, “Some observations on the structure of the teeth of grami- 
nivorous quadrupeds. . .,” Phil. Trans., 89, 243-7 (1799). 

(3) Hatchett, Charles, “Experiments and observations on shell and bone,” ibid., 89, 
315-34 (1799); Nicholson's J., 3, 500-6 (Feb., 1800); ibid., 3, 529-34 (March, 1800). 

(9) Hatchett, Charles, “Chemical experiments on zodphyles,” Phil. Trans., 90, 
327-402 (1800). 

(10) Davy, Sir H., “An account of some experiments on the constituent parts of some 
astringent vegetables,” Nicholson's J 4 , [2], 5, 259 (Aug., 1803). 

(11) Bostock, John, “Observations and experiments for the purpose of ascertaining 
the definite characters of the primary animal fluids. . .” ibid., [2], 11, 251, 254 
(Aug., 1805). 

(12) Hatchett, Charles, “An analysis of a mineral substance from North America 
containing a metal hitherto unknown,” Phil. | Trans., 92, 49-66 (1802). Read 
Nov. 26, 1801. Nicholson's J., [2], 1, 32-4 (Jan., 1802). 

(13) Hatchett, Charles, “Experiments and observations on the various alloys, the 
specific gravity, and on the comparative wear of gold,” Phil. Trans., 93, 43-194 
(1803); Nicholson's J., [2],5,286-303(Aug.,1803); ibid., [2], 6, 145-61(Nov., 1803). 

(14) Hatchett, Charles “Analysis of a triple sulphuret of lead, antimony and copper 
from Cornwall,” Phil. Trans., 94, 63-9 (1804). 

(15) Smithson, James, “On the composition of the compound sulphuret from Huel 
Boys. . .,” Nicholson's J ., [2], 20, 332-3 (Suppl., 1808). 

(16) Hatchett, Charles, “Analytical experiments land observations on lac,” Phil. 
Trans., 94, 191-218 (1804); Nicholson's J ., [2], 10, 45-55 (Jan., 1805); ibid., [2], 
10, 95-102 (Feb , 1805). 

(17) Hatchett, Charles, “An analysis of the magnetical pyrites; with remarks on 
some of the other sulphurets of iron,” Phil. Trans., 94, 315-45 (1804); Nicholson's 
J., [2], 10,265-76 (Apr., 1805); ibid., [2], 11, 6-17 (May, 1805). 

(IS) Hatchett, Charles, “Observations on the change of some of the proximate 
principles of vegetables into bitumen; with analytical experiments on a peculiar 
substance which is found with the Bovey coal,” Phil. Trans., 94, 385-410 (1804); 
Nicholson's J., [2], 10, 181-200 (March, 1805); ibid., 2, 248-53 (Sept., 1798). 

(19) Hall, Sir James, “Account of a series of experiments showing the effects of com- 
pression in modifying the effects of heat,” Nicholson's J., [2], 14, 11$ (June, 1806); 
ibid., [2], 14 , 201-2 (July, 1806). 

(20) Nugent, Nicholas, “Account of the Pitch Lake of the Island of Trinidad,” ibid., 
[2],3Z, 209 (July, 1812). 



Literature Cited 


223 


{21) Hatchett, Charles, “On an artificial substance which possesses the principal 
characteristic properties of tannin,” Phil. Trans., 95, 211-24, 285-315 (1805); ibid, 
96, 109-46(1806); Nicholson's J., [2], 12, 327-31 (Suppl., 1805); ibid., [2J, 13, 
23-36 (Jan., 1806); ibid., [2], 15, 15-31 (Sept., 1806); ibid., [2], 15, 86-98 (Oct., 
1806). 

{22) Chevreul, M. E., “Tanning substances formed by the action of nitric acid on 
several vegetable matters,” Nicholson's J., [2], 32, 360-74 (Suppl., 1812); Ann. 
chim. phys., [1 ], 73, 36-66 ( 1810). 

{23) Wolesensky, Edward, “Investigation of synthetic tanning material,” Bureau of 
Standards Technologic Paper No. 302 (1925), pp. 6-7. 

{24) Thomson, Thomas, “A System of Chemistry,” 4th ed., Bell and Bradfute, Edin- 
burgh, 1810, Vol. 5, p. 180. 

{25) Boswell, James, “Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.,” edited by J. W. Croker, 
George Bell and Sons, London, 1876, Vol. 2, pp. 325-9. 

{26) Holmes, Timothy, “Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie,” T. Fisher Unwin, London. 
1898, p. 46 and pp. 61-2. 

{27) Anonymous obituary of W. T. Brande, J. Chem. Soc. (London), 19, 509-11 (1866). 

{28) Hawkins, Charles, “The Works of Sir Benjamin Collins Brodie, with an Auto- 
biography,” Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts, and Green, London, 1865, Vol. 
1, pp. 55-8. 

{29) SOderbaum, H. G., “Jac Berzelius Bref,” Almqvist & Wiksells, Upsala, 1912-1914, 
Vol. 1, part 1, p. 42. Berzelius to Berthollet, Oct., 1812; ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, p. 
19. Marcet to Berzelius, Jan. 25, 1813; ibid., p. 45. Marcet to Berzelius, May 
5, 1813; ibid., p. 58. Berzelius to Marcet, June 30, 1813; ibid., p. 66. Marcet to 
Berzelius, July 28 and Aug. 4, 1813; ibid., p. 183. Marcet to Berzelius, Dec., 
1818; ibid., pp. 231-2. Marcet to Berzelius, Jan. 15, 1822. 

{30) Berzelius, J. J., “Reseanteckningar,” P. A. Norstedt & Soner, Stockholm, 1903, 
pp. 23-4, 29, and 38. 

{31 ) Hatchett, Charles, “On the method of separating iron from manganese,” Annals 
of Philos., 2, 343-5 (Nov., 1813); J. F. John, ibid., 2, 172-3 (Sept., 1813). 

{32) Hatchett, Charles, “A description of a process by which corn tainted with 
must may be completely purified,” Phil. Trans., 107, 36-8 (1817). Letter to Sir 
Joseph Banks. 

{33) Faulkner, Thomas, “A Historical and Topographical Description of Chelsea and 
its Environs,” T. Faulkner, Chelsea, 1829, Vol. 1, pp. 89-92. 

{34) Conybrare, J. J., “Description of a new substance found in ironstone,” Annals of 
Philos., 17, 136 (Feb., 1821); ibid., 21, 190 (March, 1823). 

{35) Smith, J. Lawrence, “Examination of American minerals. No. 6. — Description 
of columbic acid minerals from new localities in the United States, embracing a 
reclamation for the restoration of the name columbium to the element now called 
niobium. . Am. J. Sd ., [31, 13, 359-69 (May, 1877). 

[36) “New American metal,” Medical Repository, 6 , 212 (Aug., Sept., Oct., 1802); 
“Hatchett’s analysis of the American mineral substance containing a metal 
hitherto unknown,” ibid., 6 , 323-4 (Nov., Dec., 1802, Jan*, 1803). 

{37) “Place where the ore of columbium was found,” ibid. (2), 2 , 437 (Feb., Mar., Apr., 
1805). 

{38) Millin, A.-L., “Nouvelles litt£raires. Etats-Unis d’Amerique,” Magasin Encyclo - 
pidique, 6, 388-9 (1805). 

(39) “Selections from an ancient catalogue of objects of natural history, formed in 
New England more than one hundred years ago by John Winthrop, F, R. S.,” 
Am. J. Sci. (1), 47 , 282-90 (1844) ; Journal Book of the Roy. Soc., 15 , 451-87 
(June 27, 1734). 



224 Discovery of the Elements 

(40) Sweet, Jessie M., "Sir Hans Sloane: Life and mineral collection,” Natural His- 
tory Mag. t 5, 115-6 (July, 1935). 

(41) “A report on the Geological Survey of the state of Connecticut by Professor 
Charles Upham Shepard, M.D., . . . with extracts and remarks by the editor 
[B. Silliman],” Am. J. Set. (1), 33, 162-3 (1838). 

(42) Smith, Edgar F., "Chemistry in Old Philadelphia,” J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadel- 
phia, 1919 , pp, 14-22. 

(43) "New metal columbium,” Nicholson's J., 14, 181 (June, 1806). 

(44) Browne, C. A., “Scientific notes from the books and letters of John Winthrop 
Jr. (1606-1676), first governor of Connecticut,” Isis , 11, 325-42 (1928). 

(45) Letter of Allyn B. Forbes to C. A. Browne, Apr. 5, 1940. Quoted by permission. 

(46) “Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society,” Boston, 1882 , series 5, 
Vol. 8, pp. 126-7. 

(47) Smith, Edgar F., “Chemistry in America,” D. Appleton and Co., New York 
and London, 1914 , p. 36. 

(48) Weeks, M. E. and L. O. Amberg, “M.-E. Chevreul. The fiftieth anniversary of 
his death,” J. Am. Pharm. Assoc., Set. Ed., 29, 89-96 (Feb., 1940). 



XIII. THE SCIENTIFIC CONTRIBUTIONS OF DON ANDRfiS 
MANUEL DEL RlO* 

Although A. M . del Rio, the eminent discoverer of the element now known 
as vanadium , spent most of his active life in Mexico and a few years in 
Philadelphia, his services to chemistry and mineralogy are not as widely 
known and appreciated by American scientists as they deserve to be. He was 
a schoolmate and honored friend of Baron A lexander von Humboldt and a 
worthy colleague of Don Fausto de Elhuyar, first director of the School of 
Mines of Mexico. 

Andres Manuel del Rio y Fernandez was born on Ave Maria Street in 
Madrid on November 10, 1764, t and received his preliminary training at 
the College of San Isidro. At the age of fifteen years he completed his 
courses in Latin, Greek, literature, and theology and received his Bachelor’s 
degree from the famous University of Alcala de Henares, which, two cen- 
turies before, had rivaled Salamanca. When Don Jos € Solano held a 
public contest in experimental physics, the young graduate in theology 
distinguished himself so highly that the King provided for his further edu- 
cation at the Mining Academy of Almaden. Because of del Rio’s enthusi- 
asm for mining and subterranean geometry, the Minister of the Indies, 
Don Diego Gardoqui, selected him to study in France, England, and 
Germany at government expense (I). 

He studied chemistry in Paris under Jean Darcet and attended lectures 
in medicine and natural history. In 1789 he enrolled at the Royal School 
of Mines in Freiberg, Saxony, where great things were expected of him 
because of the enviable records made previously by his fellow countrymen 
Don Juan Josd and Don Fausto de Elhuyar. He, too, soon felt the charm 
of A. G. Werner’s teaching of geognosy and mineralogy. One of del 
Rio’s intimate friends at the Freiberg Academy was his schoolmate, Baron 
Alexander von Humboldt, who later renewed the friendship in Mexico. 
Del Rio also studied subterranean geometry, analytical chemistry, and 
metallurgy at the Royal School of Mining and Forestry at Schemnitz, 
Hungary (Sti&vnica Bafiska, Czechoslovakia). 

In 1791 Sefior del Rio visited the metallurgical industries of England. 
During a second sojourn in France, he was associated with Lavoisier, and 
in the troublous days of 1793, he, too, almost fell prey to the fury of the 
revolutionists. According to Ramirez (1), del Rio disguised himself as a 
water carrier and escaped to England. Although offered the directorships 
of several mining enterprises, he declined them. 

* Presented before the Division of History of Chemistry at the Cleveland meeting of 
theA.C.S.,Sept. 11, 1934. 

t Although the year of del Rio’s birth has frequently been given as 1765, Ramirez 
(Ref. 1 ) obtained the above date from the birth certificate. 

225 



226 


Discovery of the Elements 


In 1793 a royal order decreed that Werner’s theory of the formation of 
veins be taught at the School of Mines of Mexico recently founded by Don 
Fausto de Elhuyar (2). The professorship of mineralogy was therefore 
offered to Sefior del Rio, who had previously declined that of chemistry. 
Early in August, 1794, he set sail from Cadiz on the warship San Pedro 
Alcantara, taking with him a servant and a supply of apparatus for the 
School of Mines. Eleven weeks later he disembarked at Vera Cruz ( 3 ). 

After arriving at Mexico City, del Rio immediately arranged the min- 
eral collections and planned his course in oryctognosy, which included 
mineralogy, geognosy, and paleontology and which began on April 27, 
1795. The new world spread forth before him so many objects of scien- 
tific inquiry that he afterward wrote with enthusiasm: “Each step of the 
traveler in this Republic discovers to him something new” (4). 

In 1795 he published the first edition of his “Elements of Oryctognosy” 
(5), which von Humboldt regarded as “the best mineralogical work which 
Spanish literature possesses” (6), and which Santiago Ramirez (7) called 
“a monumental work, which . . . will be an object of veneration and con- 
sultation by the mineralogists of our country and for all those who . . . are 
occupied in studying the mineralogy of our native country.” 

Dd Rio’s paper on the best method of sinking mine shafts was printed 
for use in all the mines of Mexico, and his article on the relations between 
the composition of a mineral and the materials of which the vein is com- 
posed was published in the supplement to the Gaceta de Mexico on January 
18, 1797 (I), (3). 

The most outstanding achievement of del Rio’s long, useful life was his 
discovery in 1801 of the metal now known as vanadium. He found that 
the brown lead mineral, plomo pardo de Zimapan (< 8 ), from the Cardonal 
Mine in Hidalgo contained what he believed to be a new metal. Because 
its salts are of varied colors, he at first called it panchromium , but because 
its salts with the alkalies and earths become red on heating or on treatment 
with acids, he later changed the name to erythronium (1), (9), (10). 

When von Humboldt visited Mexico in 1803, del Rio gave him several 
specimens of the brown lead ore. Von Humboldt sent some of them to the 
Institut de France with an explanatory letter giving del Rio’s analysis and 
his conclusions regarding the close resemblance of the new metal to chro- 
mium and uranium, A more detailed description addressed to Chaptal 
was lost in a shipwreck (10). 

Since the properties of erythronium closely resembled those which 
Fourcroy had ascribed to the recently discovered metal chromium, del 
Rio lost confidence in the importance of his discovery and concluded that 
his supposed new element was, after all, nothing but chromium ( 11 ). 
In a note to his translation of Karsten’s “Mineralogical Tables” he wrote 
( 7 ), ( 9 ), (12) : . . but, knowing that chromium also gives by evaporation . 



Andr6s Manuel del Rio 227 

red or yellow salts, I believe that the brown lead is a yellow oxide of chro- 
mium, combined with excess lead also in form of the yellow oxide." 

Dr. Ernst Wittich, German Ambassador to Mexico, has pointed out that 
Baron von Humboldt was also led into the same error, for the specimen in 
the Museum fur Naturkunde in Berlin is labeled in the Baron’s handwriting: 
"Brown lead ore from the veins of Zimap&n in northern Mexico. Lead 
chromate. M. del Rio thought he had discovered a new metal in it, which 
he named erythronium, then panchromium ; later he realized that it was 
ordinary chromium." The label was later corrected by Gustav Rose to 
read: “Vanadiumbleierz” (vanadium lead ore) (29). 

Another circumstance which helped to shake del Rio’s confidence in his 
own work was the analysis of this mineral which Collet-Descotils, a friend 
of Vauquelin, published in 1805 (13), When Collet-Descotils concluded 
that the supposed new metal was merely chromium, del Rio warmly de- 
fended his own prior claim to the "discovery" of chromium in the brown 
lead ore (14), 

The details of Sefstrom’s discovery of vanadium in soft iron from the 
Taberg Mine in Sm&land, Sweden, and of Wohler’s proof of the identity of 
erythronium and vanadium have already been related (14), (15), (16). 
Dr. Moles has emphasized the fact that del Rio’s own excessive modesty 
and scientific caution led him to renounce the discovery of the new element 
before the analysis of Collet-Descotils had been published. 

Unaware of the shipwreck which had prevented Humboldt from giving 
full publicity to the discovery of erythronium, del Rio wrote in 1832 in his 
"Elements of Oryctognosy" : "When he left Mexico, I gave him ... a 
copy in French of my experiments in order that he might publish them. 
If he had judged them worthy of public attention, they would have excited 
the curiosity of chemists, and the discovery of the new metal would not have 
been delayed for thirty years, which is the objection now unjustly made 
against me. He did not even show Descotils the copy of my experiments, 
for, since he [Descotils] was a chemist, he would have appreciated them 
better, would have repeated them, and with his knowledge of chromium, 
which I lacked, it would have been easy for him to decide that it was a 
distinct metal" (7), (17). Since at that time chromium must have been a 
novelty even in Europe and since it often required ten or twelve years for 
the news of European discoveries to reach Mexico (22), del Rio should not 
be criticized for having been uninformed as to the properties of this metal. 

For a number of years del Rio taught not only mineralogy and mining, 
but also Spanish and French, and served as one of the editors of the Gaceta 
de Mexico, to which he contributed many articles, both literary and scien- 
tific. In order that his students might "be proud of a country that offers 
so many opportunities for admiring Nature," del Rio added to his transla- 
tion of Karsten’s "Mineralogical Tables" a number of descriptions of 



228 


Discovery of the Elements 


>x 


ELEMENTOS 


^ ORICTOGNOSIA, 


CONOCIMIENTO DE LOS FOSILES, 

SEOUN EL SISTEAfjJ BE BERCELIO,' 

/*► 

^ Y SEOUN LOS 

't^'RINCIPlOS DE ABRAHAM GOTTLOB WERNER. 

^ CON LA 

^ IZVOVZXXA 

% Jnglcsci, Alemana y Francesa , 

% 

PAHA USO DEL 

*>*SEMINARIO NACIONAL DE MINERIA 

DE MEXICO. 


• For el C. J1NDRES DEL RIO , 

bFESOR DE MINERALOGIA DEL MISMO Y SOCIO Y CORRESPONSAL 
DE ALGUNAS AC'ADEMIAS NACIONALES Y ESTHANGERA6. 


PARTE PRACTICA— SEGUNDA EDICION 


FILADELFU 

Imprenta de Juan F. Hurtel. 


^ 188 *. 

H Ate 

Courtesy Am. Philosophical Soc. 

Title Page of del Rio’s "Elements of Oryctognosy” 
Written According to the System of Berzelius and 
the Principles of A. G. Werner 


minerals from “this 
America” and “the 
other America.” 
Since a French re- 
viewer (5) had criti- 
cized him in 1797 for 
not completely adopt- 
ing the new nomen- 
clature proposed by 
Lavoisier, del Rio 
wrote in 1804, “Usage 
has accepted oxtgeno 
in place of arcicayo , 
oxido in place of cayo 
. . . and I have ad- 
justed the nomencla- 
ture in conformity 
with it” ( 9 ). In 1805 
he published the sec- 
ond volume of his 
“Elements of Oryc- 
tognosy.” 

In the following 
year he established at 
Coalcoman, Michoa- 
can, the first iron- 
works in Mexico, 
which, however, were 
destroyed during the 
insurrection of 1811 
(I), (3). An incident 
related by Ramirez (1) 
illustrates the fairness 
of del Rio’s judgment. 
When the master 
blacksmith at the 
Coalcoman ironworks, 
who regarded his own 
skill as superior to that 
of del Rio, asked for 


the use of an experimental furnace, del Rio granted the request. Although 


the experiments resulted disastrously, del Rio’s report merely stated: 
<4 PiHado did not succeed very well, but these are the first experiments.” 



Del Rfo and Baron von Humboldt 


229 


Von Humboldt, who 
was greatly interested 
in del Rfo’s pumping 
engine, described it as 
follows: “This engine, 
which is the first of 
this kind constructed 
in America, is much 
superior to those in 
the mines of Hungary ; 
it was constructed ac- 
cording to the esti- 
mates and plans of 
Sefior del Rio, profes- 
sor of mineralogy of 
Mexico, who has vis- 
ited the most famous 
mines of Europe and 
who possesses most 
thorough and varied 
erudition ; and Mr. 
Lachaussde, an artisan 
native of Brabant, a 
man of marked ability, 
built it. . . . It is un- 
fortunate that this 
beautiful engine, 
whose throttle valve is 
provided with a special 
mechanism, is set up 
in a place where it is 
difficult to get enough 
water to run it con- 
tinuously. . . The 
Baron then explained 
that the amount of 
water had been esti- 
mated in an unusually 









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Courtesy Am. Philosophical Soc , 

In a presentation copy of his translation of Kars ten’s 
“Mineralogical Tables,” del Rio wrote as follows: “To the 
Philosophical Society of Philadelphia this work is most 
respectfully dedicated, which contains four new dis- 
coveries, viz. — the sulphur of manganese, acknowledged 
by Mr. Proust to have been discovered by me — the scws- 
chromate of lead , the analysis of which is contained in these 
tables, and was published in the Annales of Natural 
Sciences at Madrid as a discovery of mine a year before 
that of Mr. Des-Cotils at Paris — the hydrophanous copper 
(the Dioptase of Mr. Hau£), which contains the same 
principles of that found in Sibiria and analyzed by Mr. 
Lowitz, viz., silex, water, and oxide of copper — also the 
lavender bleu copper ore, which* is a carbonate of copper 
and silver possessing the greatest proportion of the former, 
by the translator AndrS del Rio, Mexico the 2 June 1818.” 


rainy year, and added 
that “Sefior del Rfo, when he arrived in New Spain, had no other aim 
than that of proving to Mexican mine operators the effect of such ma- 
chines and the possibility of making them in this country. . . ” (6). 
Ramirez (1) stated, however, that del Rfo had predicted the diminution of 



230 Discovery of the Elements 

water supply, but had been unable to prevent the deforestation which 
had caused it. 

In 1820 deputies were appointed to the Spanish court. H. H. Bancroft 
stated in his “History of Mexico” that this election “took place with no 
little disorder” and that “. . . the choice fell almost exclusively on ecclesias- 
tics and lawyers, with a sprinkling of soldiers, merchants, and men of no 
particular calling, among whom were three natives of Spain” ( 18 ). One 
of the latter was Andres Manuel del Rio, who pleaded earnestly for the 
independence of his adopted country. Although Elhuyar resigned his 
position and returned to Spain during the struggle, del Rio was in sympathy 
with the new cause ( 19 ) and, according to Maffei and de la Rua Figueroa 
(I), was one of the few deputies to vote for absolute independence. 

During his visit to Spain, del Rio was offered the directorship of the 
mines of Almad&i and of the Museum of Sciences in Madrid, but he pre- 
ferred to return to Mexico. While he was in Bordeaux, Sefiora de Elhuyar 
said to him, “Where are you going, del Rio? Don’t you know that Mexico 
has become independent?” “Yes, ,: replied del Rio, “and I am going home 
to my country” (I). Because of his loyal friends and eager, intelligent 
students, his splendid collection of minerals from both hemispheres, the 
undiscovered wonders of the new vjorld, and the charm of his virtuous 
Mexican wife, del Rio had come to regard Mexico as his homeland. Per- 
haps another incentive for his return was the impressive structure for the 
School of Mines which had been completed in 1813, and which Mr. Beul- 
loch, a contemporary English traveler, described as follows ( 20 ) : 

“The edifice in which it is located excels in its dimensions and in the 
beauty of its architecture all those in Europe destined for the same pur- 
pose. It was erected at great cost [l 1 /* million pesos] and amply provided 
with everything necessary for the mine owners and other rich inhabitants.” 
Earthquakes soon damaged the noble structure to such an extent that by 
1830 extensive repairs were needed. The architect took the high building 
apart, placed the stately columns in the patio, and put them back in place 
without losing a single piece (7). 

In 1824 del Rfo published an analysis of a gold-rhodium alloy from the 
smelting house in Mexico which was similar to the gold-palladium ingot 
previously reported by Joseph Cloud, director of the Philadelphia Mint 
( 21 ). Three years later he published a translation of Berzelius’ ‘‘New 
mineral system” ( 22 ). He served for some time on a committee appointed 
to inspect the money and improve working conditions at the Mint. 

In acknowledgment of his allegiance, the new government, which ex- 
pelled most Spaniards from Mexico in 1828, made an exception in the case 
of del Rfo. Nevertheless, he preferred to share the fate of his fdlow- 
countrymen and therefore spent four years of voluntary exile in Philadel- 
phia. In the preface to the second edition of his “Elements of Oryctog- 



Del Rio as a Teacher 231 

nosy,” published in Philadelphia in 1832 at the expense of the Mining 
Tribunal of Mexico, he wrote: 

“Knowing by experience the happy disposition of Mexican youth for 
the study of these sciences, I wish in the last third of my life to consecrate 
to it the limited product of my efforts, immeasurably happy if I can some 
day be useful to a country where I have lived for thirty-five years, re- 

A LA MEMORIA DEL DIST1NGUID0 SAR10 


VL mipziio v fFiftn* 

MIKII4LOOIKTA 

D. ANDRES MANUEL DEL RIO 


CUVA MBRICIS* PAMA LO 
PARA MR EL 


IKTMCTOR m US CTCJICIA8 If ATURALK8 


■ X XITSATRA PATRIA 

CUYO ACI5NDRADO AMOK A MEXICO LO II ACE FIOURAIt ENTRE 
NUE8TKOS MAS I LUSTRES COM PATRIOT AS; 

V El* CUYAS OBUA8 CIKNTIFICAS HAN BKBIDO LA INSTRUCTION NUKSTRAF 
GENERACIONEM DE M I N EROS, 


PCUll-A omit L"« MORENAJB 


ESTE IN SIGNIFIC ANTE TllABAJO 


ti m mum de sis admibadores. 

Dedication Page of “The Mineral Wealth of 
Mexico and Its Present State of Development/' 
Which S. RamIrez Wrote for the New Orleans Expo- 
sition of 1884 . 

Translation: “To the memory of the distinguished 
scientist, expert mine operator, and celebrated miner- 
alogist, D. Andres Manuel del Rio, whose well deserved 
fame designated him to be the introducer of the natural 
sciences into our country, whose stainless love for Mexico 
makes him figure among our most illustrious fellow citi- 
zens, and from whose scientific books our generations 
of mine operators have imbibed ins true tion, this unim- 
portant work is dedicated as a tribute by the most re- 
spectful of his admirers.” 


ceiving every kind of distinction. If the result is not proportional to my 
high aim, it will at least be admitted that I aspire to manifest in the only 
manner possible to me my gratitude for the distinguished favors with which 
the Mexicans have honored me; my only merit is to be thankful” (17). 

In his unassuming devotion to his teaching duties, del Rio resembled 
John Dalton, One day in 1841, when a student knocked at the door of his 
classroom to announce a distinguished visitor, del Rio asked the messenger 



232 


Discovery of the Elements 


to have the visitor wait for him. When the bell rang at the close of the 
class period, del Rio greeted Sefior Calderon de la Barca, minister pleni- 
potentiary from the Court at Madrid. His Excellency, moreover, was not 
offended at the delay (1). 

Del Rio belonged to many scientific organizations of France, Germany, 
Great Britain, Mexico, and Spain, and was an active member of the Ameri- 
can Philosophical Society and president of the Geological Society of Phila- 
delphia. From 1830 to 1834 he attended the meetings of the American 
Philosophical Society, took part in the discussions, donated books which 
are still in possession of the Society’s library, and presented papers for 
publication. 

The translation of Karsten’s Tables contains in del Rio’s handwriting 
the following note of presentation: “To the Philosophical Society of 
Philadelphia, this work is most respectfully dedicated, which contains four 
new discoveries — the sulphur of manganese , acknowledged by Mr. Proust 
to have been discovered by me — the sous -chromate of lead . . . the hy - 
drophanous copper . . . also the lavender . . . copper ore This note was written 
in 1818, but in 1827 del Rio wrote: “I thank Sr. Breithaupt for . . . believ- 
ing me the first discoverer of manganese sulfide ... I am indeed [discoverer] 
of that of los Mijes in the state of Qajaca [Oaxaca]; but we must be just 
Sr. Proust discovered that of Transylvania two years before” [22). Del 
Rio added that at that time many European discoveries were not known in 
Mexico until ten or twelve years after publication. In the second edition 
of his “Elements of Oryctognosy,” del Rio wrote: “In a work such as this 
little can be called one’s own : only a few articles belong to me, such as the 
manganese sulfide of Oaxaca, the brown lead of Zimapan, the mercury iodide 
of Casas Viejas, the blue silver of Catorce, and the zinc selenide of Culebras” 
(17). 

His requests for a small specimen of “sulphuret of silver” and other min- 
erals for analysis were granted by the Philosophical Society. At its meet- 
ings he must have met A. D. Bache, F. Bache, Robert Hare, Joseph 
Henry, G. W. Featherstonhaugh, and other contemporary American 
scientists. Ramirez (i) mentions a process of purifying mercury which del 
Rio had learned from Professor Hare of Philadelphia. 

In 1830 del Rio read a paper on Becquerel’s method of reducing silver 
ores (23). His paper (24) on the crystals developed in vermiculite by heat 
begins: * ( A pupil of the celebrated Werner, I have always been more of a 
Neptunian than a Plutonist, notwithstanding the many crystallizations 
produced in the dry way. A new instance which has come under my obser- 
vation in the crystals of vermiculite has contributed materially to change 
my opinions ” 

Dr. Meigs had heated a specimen of vermiculite in a candle flame and 
had shown del Rio the worm-like filaments which shoot out from it. Under - 



Del Rfo and the School of Mines of Mexico 


233 


the blowpipe, the Mexican scientist obtained from it oblique prisms nearly 
an inch long, which were also ‘‘crooked and worm-like. ” Vermiculite is a 
hydrous silicate generally produced by alteration of mica. 

Between 1835 and 1837 several polemical articles by del Rio and Charles 
U. Shepard, the well-known American mineralogist and collector of meteo- 
rites, appeared in the American Journal of Science {25). 

In 1834 del Rio was given the chair of geology in addition to that of 
mineralogy. Before returning to Mexico, he purchased for the Mining 
Seminary a splendid collection of shells and fossils collected by a Polish 
naturalist who had recently died in Philadelphia. In 1841 he published a 
manual of geology describing the fossil flora and fauna of the various rocks, 
with special emphasis on those found in Mexico (7), {26). Two years later 
del Rio, then about seventy-eight years of age, served on a committee to 
study the manufacture of porcelain and determine whether or not the raw 
materials were available in the Republic. Their report, which was highly 
praised by the Bureau of National Industry, was published in El Siglo 
XIX on May 10, 1843, and a porcelain works was established at Puebla {3). 

Two years later del Rio was still serving as professor of mineralogy, but 
in the following year he asked for a substitute in order that he might com- 
plete the supplement to his textbook, which was to include discussions of 
the most recent discoveries made in Europe and the United States. Ac- 
cording to Senor Ramirez (7), this was published in 1849 {27). In spite of 
failing eyesight, del Rio continued, almost to the close of his life, to con- 
tribute to the literary and scientific periodicals of Mexico, yet in spite of 
his illustrious services, he was reduced to poverty in his old age {28). On 
March 23, 1849, he suffered a fatal cerebral attack. 

Del Rio’s colleague, Don Joaquin Velazquez de Le6n, said in his eulogy: 
“I still seem to see him leaving this college at the close of the day’s teach- 
ing, with his book under his arm (for he used to say that the support of 
science does not dishonor anyone) ; surrounded at the doorway of the insti- 
tution by the unfortunate and the destitute, sharing with them his meager 
salary, and returning to aid those who were already waiting for him at the 
doors of his home” (I). In 1877 a rich mining region of Chihuahua was 
named in his honor the Andres del Rio canton , with Batopilas as its capitol 
( 7 ). 

It is a pleasure to acknowledge the kind assistance of Miss Eva Armstrong 
of the Edgar Fahs Smith Memorial Library, the library of the American 
Philosophical Society, Dr. E. Moles and Senor A. de Gdlvez-Cafiero of 
Madrid, and Dr. F. B. Dains. 

Literature Cited 

(I) Maffei, E. and R. R. Figueroa, “Apuntes para una biblioteca espafiola de 
libros. « .relativos al conocimiento y explotacibn de las riqtiezas mineral es,” Im- 



234 


Discovery of the Elements 


prenta de J. M. Lapuente, Madrid, 1872, 2 Vols., 529 and 693 pp.; J. VelAzqubz 
de Lb6n, “Elogio funebre del Sr. D. AndrAs del Rio,” El Album Mexicano, Im- 
prenta de Cumplido, Mexico, 1849, Vol. 2, pp. 219-25; S. RamIrez, “Biografia 
del Sr. D. Andres Manuel del Rio,” Boletin de la Soc. Mexicana de Geografia y 
Estadistica , [4 ], 2, 205-51 (1890). 

( 2 ) Weeks, M. E., “The scientific contributions of the de Elhuyar brothers,” J. 
Chem. Educ., 11, 413-9 (July, 1934). 

(3) RamIrez, S., “Datos para la historia del Colegio de Mineria,” government publi- 
cation for the Alzate Society, Mexico, 1890, 494 pp. 

(4) Del Rfo, A. M., “Analysis of two new mineral substances, consisting of bi-seleniuret 
of zinc and seleniuret of mercury, found at Culebras in Mexico,” Phil. Mag., [2], 
4, 113-5 (Aug., 1828). 

(5) Del Rio, A. M., “Elementos de orictognosia,” Imprenta de Zuniga y Ontiveros, 
Mexico, 1795, Vol. 1, 172 pp.; ibid., 1805, Vol. 2, 200 pp.; Vol. 1 reviewed in 
Ann. chim. phys., [1 ], 21, 221-4 (Feb., 1797). 

(6) von Humboldt, A., “Ensayo politico sobre Nueva Espana,” 3rd ed., Libreria de 
Lecointe, Paris, 1836, Vol. 1, pp. 232, 236-8; Vol. 3, pp. 117-8. 

(7) RamIrez, S., “Noticia historica de la riqueza minera de Mexico,” Secretaria de 
Fomento, Mexico, 1884, 768 pp. 

(8) “ZimapAn, the Leadville of Mexico,” Modern Mexico , 13, 30-1 (Sept., 1902). 

(9) Del Rfo, A. M., “Tablas Mineralogicas Dispuestas segun los Descubrimientos MAs 
Recientes e Ilustradas con Notas por D. L. G. Karsten,” Zufiiga y Ontiveros, 
Mexico, 1804, pp. 60-62; Ram6n de la Quadra, “Introduction A las tablas com- 
parativas de las substancias metAlicas*” Anales ciencias naturales (Madrid), 6, 46 
(May, 1803). 

(10) Wittich, E. f “Zur Entdeckungsgeschichte des Elementes Vanadium,” Technik- 
Industrie und Schweizer Chem.-Ztg., 16, 4-5 (Jan. 31, 1933). 

(11) de Fourcroy, A.-F., “Syst&me des connaissances chimiques,” Baudouin, Paris, 
1800 (Brumaire, an IX). Vol. 5, pp. 107-13. 

(12) Del Rfo, A. M., “Discurso de las vetas,” Gaceta de Mexico, Nov. 12, 1802; Anales 
de las Ciencias Naturales (Madrid), 7, 31 (Feb., 1804). These references taken 
from E. Moles, Ref. (15). 

(13) Collet- Descotils, H. V., “Analyse de la mine brune de plomb de ZimapAn, dans 
le royaume du Mexique, envoy 6e par M. Humboldt, et dans laquelle M. del Rio 
dit avoir dAcouvert un nouveau mAtal,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 53, 268-71 (1805); 
J. L. Gay-Lussac, “Biographical account of Hippolyte-Victor Collet-Descotils,” 
Annals of Philosophy, 9, 417-21 (1817); Ann. chim. phys., [2], 4, 213 (Feb., 1817). 

(14) Wittich, E., “El descubrimiento del vanadio,” Boletin Minero, 13, 4-15 (Jan., 
1922) ; see also del Rio’s autograph letter reproduced on page 173. 

(15) Moles, E., “Wolframio, no tungsteno. Vanadio o eritronio,” Anales soc. espaft. 
fis. quint., [3], 26, 234-52 (June, 1928). 

(16) Weeks, M. E., “The discovery of the elements,” J. Chem. Educ., 9, 873-82 
(May, 1932); ibid., 2nd ed., Mack Printing Co., Easton, Pa., 1934, pp. 87-98. 

(17) Del Rio, A. M., “Elementos de Orictognosia,” 2nd ed., John Hurtel, Philadelphia, 
1832, pp. 484-5. 

(18) Bancroft, H. H., “The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft,” A. L. Bancroft and 
Co., San Francisco, 1885, Vol. 12, p. 699. 

(19) de GAlvez-CaNero, A., “Apuntes BiogrAficos de D. Fausto de Elhuyar,” GrAficas 
reunidas, Madrid, 1933, pp. 107-68. 

(20) Bbulloch, “Viage a Mexico en 1828,” El Album Mexicano, Imprenta del Cum- 
plido, Mexico, 1849» Vol. 2, p. 492; See also: T. A. Rickard, “Journeys of Oh- 



Literature Cited 235 

servation among the Mines of Mexico,” Dewey Publishing Co., San Francisco, 
1907 , pp. 30-31. 

(21) Del Rfo, A. M., “Analysis of a specimen of gold found to be alloyed with rho- 
dium, M El Sol , Dec. 11, 1824; Am. J. Sci., 11 , 298-304 (1826); Ann . chim. phys., 
[2], 29 , 137-47 (1825); Annals of Philosophy, [2], 10 , 251-6 (Oct., 1825); E. F. 
Smith, “Chemistry in Old Philadelphia,” J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia, 
1919 , pp. 85-90. 

(22) Del Rfo, A. M., “Nuevo Sistema Mineral del Senor Bercelio del Ano de 1825,” 
Imprenta del Aguila, Mexico, 1827 , 28 pp. 

(23) Del Rio, A. M., “Silver ores reduced by the method of Becquerel,” Trans. Am. 
Phil. Soc., N. S., 4 , 60-2 (1834). Read Nov. 5, 1830. 

(24) Del Rio, A. M., “On the crystals developed in vermiculite by heat,” ibid., 5 , 
137-8 (1837). Read Nov. 1, 1833. 

(25) Shepard, C. U., “Reply to ‘Observations on the treatise of mineralogy of Mr. C. 
U. Shepard/ by Andr6s del Rio. . . , ” Am. J. Sci., 27 , 312-25 (1835); A. M. del 
Rfo, ibid., 30 , 384-7 (1836); ibid., 31 , 131-4(1837). 

(26) Del Rio, A. M., “Manual de geologia extractado de la lethaea geognostica de 
Bronn con los animales y vegetales perdidos. . .,” Ignacio Cumplido, Mexico, 1841 . 

(27) Del Rio, A. M., “Suplemento de adiciones y correciones de mi Mineralogia 
impresaen Filadelfia en 1832,” Tipografia de R. Rafael, Mexico, 1849 . 

(28) Moles, E., “Discurso leido en el acto de su recepcion. Del momento cientifico 
espahol 1775-1825,” Acad, ciencias exactas, fisicas, y naturales de Madrid, C. 
Bermejo, Madrid, 1934 , pp. 97-105. 

(29) Wittich, E., “Zur Entdeckungsgeschichte des Elementes Vanadium,” Forschun- 
gen und Fortschritte, 9 , 38-9 (Jan. 20, 1933). 



XIV. THE PLATINUM METALS 

The earliest scientific descriptions of platinum are those of Dr. Brownrigg 
and Don Antonio de Ulloa in the middle of the eighteenth century. Rhodium , 
palladium , osmium , and iridium were discovered in 1803 and 1804 , the first 
two by Dr. Wollaston and the others by his friend , Smithson Tennant . Thom - 
son*s “ History of Chemistry" and Berzelius' correspondence and diary 
present a pleasing picture of these two great English chemists . Ruthenium , 
Russian member of the platinum family , was discovered much later by 
Karl Karlovich Klaus , whose life story was beautifully told by the late Pro- 
fessor B. N. Menschutkin of the Polytechnic Institute of Leningrad. 


A successful pursuit of science makes a man the bene- 
factor of all mankind and of every age (1). 

Platinum 

Although platinum occurs as grains and nuggets in the alluvial sands of 

many rivers, there is only slight evi- 
dence of its use by ancient peoples. 
The pre-Columbian Indians, how- 
ever, near the place now known as La 
Tolita, Esmeraldas, Ecuador (39), 
produced white alloys of gold and 
platinum, from which they made 
many little artifacts, some of which 
are now preserved in the University 
of Pennsylvania Museum in Phila- 
delphia and the Danish National 
Museum in Copenhagen . Since plati - 
num cannot be melted with any 
primitive source of heat, Paul Bergs0e 
(40) believes that a little gold was 
mixed with the grains of platinum 
in order to seal them together as the 
gold was melted, and that the sin- 
tered mass was then subjected to 
alternate heating and hammering. 

In 1557 a famous Italian scholar 
and poet, Julius Caesar Scaliger, or 
della Scala, made what is probably 
the first definite allusion to plati- 
num. In his well-known work “On 
Subtlety/* Girolamo Cardano (1501-1576) had defined a metal as “a sub- 
stance which can be melted and which hardens on cooling/* In his Exo- 

236 



Julius Caesar Scaliger 
1484-1558 

Italian physician, scholar, and 
poet. In 1557 he made a brief 
allusion to a refractory metal which 
was probably platinum. His son 
Joseph Justus Scaliger was a famous 
philologist. 


Platinum 


237 


lericarum exercitationum liber quintus 
decimus de subtilitate ad Hieronymum 
Cardanum, Scaliger pointed out that 
such a definition would exclude mer- 
cury and also another metal, found 
between Mexico and Darien, “which 
no fire nor any Spanish artifice has 
yet been able to liquefy” (41), (54). 

Charles Wood, a metallurgist and 
assayer, found in Jamaica some plati- 
num from Carthagena, [Colombia] , 
and in 1741 took some of it to his 
relative, Dr. Brownrigg. After 
preparing a thorough and accurate 
description of the metal and its 
properties, Dr. Brownrigg in 1750 
presented these specimens to the 
Royal Society of London. The ex- 
hibit included the ore as found in 



Sir William Watson, 1715-1787 
British physician, naturalist, and 
electrician who contributed many 
original papers and summaries of the 
work of others to the Philosophical 
Transactions. In 1750 he communi- 
cated Dr. William Brownrigg ’s paper 
on platinum to the Royal Society. 
This portrait was engraved by Thorn - 
thwaite after a painting by Abbott 



Don Antonio de Ulloa 
x 1716-1795 

Spanish mathematician, naval officer, 
and traveler. The log of his voyage 
to Peru published in 1748 contains a 
description of platinum. 

Nature, the purified metal, the fused 
metal, and a sword with a pummel 
made partly of platinum (2). 

In 1735 the French and Spanish 
governments sent a scientific ex- 
pedition to Peru and to Ecuador 
to measure a degree of meridian 
at Quito, close to the equator. One 
of the two naval officers appointed 
by Philip V to take charge of the 
expedition was the brilliant young 
mathematician, Don Antonio de 
Ulloa (1716-1796). The French 
ship on which he returned in 1744 
was compelled to surrender to the 
British at the port of Louisburg, 
Cape Breton, but the English naval 
officers treated him with the utmost 
courtesy and kindness, preserved 


238 


Discovery of the Elements 


his scientific records, and guaranteed him a safe passage to England. 

When he petitioned the Admiralty for the return of his papers, says Don 
Antonio de Ulloa, they '‘unanimously, and with pleasure, granted the 
contents of my memorial, nobly adding that they were not at war with 
the arts and sciences, or their professors.” Upon his arrival in London, de 
Ulloa was introduced to Martin Folkes, the president of the Royal Society, 
and to many other distinguished men and was elected to membership 
in that society (32). 

In 1746 de Ulloa returned to Madrid, and, with Jorge Juan, prepared for 
publication the memorable “Historical Account of the Voyage to South 
America,” which was published in 1748 (55), (55), (55). In the preface to 
his “Astronomical and Physical Observations,” Jorge Juan said that Ulloa 
regarded platinum as a peculiar metal and anticipated that there must be 
special mines of it just as there are of gold and silver (55). 

De Ulloa described it as follows: “In the district of Chocb are many 
mines of Lavadero, or wash gold . . . several of the mines have been aban- 
doned on account of the platina ; a substance of such resistance that, when 
struck on an anvil of steel, it is not easy to be separated; nor is it calcin- 
able; so that the metal, inclosed within this obdurate body, could not be 
extracted without infinite labour and Charge . . . (55), (57).” 

De Ulloa and Jorge Juan sent a dozen copies of this log to members of 
the Royal Society of London. On December 19, 1748, William Watson 
(later Sir William) wrote as follows: “Only last Wednesday I was de- 
lighted to receive the copies of your book which you intended for me and 
your other friends, for which I sincerely thank you .... On Thursday Mr. 
Folkes did not fail to present . . . the copy marked for the Royal Society 
.... The Society voted its special thanks to you both for the gift of a book 
so charged with curious, choice, and interesting information” (58). 

Unfortunately, de Ulloa’s many activities did not leave him time for a 
thorough investigation of the new metal. After studying the sciences and 
useful arts of several European countries, he returned to Spain and reor- 
ganized the Schools of Medicine and Surgery, established the textile in- 
dustry, and developed the mercury mines of Almad&i. In 1758 he was 
sent to Peru to superintend the mercury mines of Huancavelica. 

When the Treaty of Fontainebleau gave Spain authority over Louisiana, 
Charles III in 1765 ordered Don Antonio to take possession. When he ar- 
rived at New Orleans in a heavy storm, the colonists gave him “a respect- 
ful, but cold and somber, greeting” (59). In his “History of Louisiana,” 
Albert Phelps explained: “He was cold, reserved, and proud, but the 
source of his dignity — his reputation as a man of learning and science — 
was all unknown to Louisiana, and therefore his assumption of authority, 
unsupported by any appearance, was taken to be mere arrogance or preten- 



Antonio de Ulloa 239 

tion” (SO). Another historian stated that “his scientific spirit, as often 
happens, led him to waste his time on trifling details’' (59). 

When his fiancee arrived from Peru, they were married at the Balize by 
the chaplain of the vessel which had brought her. This unceremonious 
procedure, together with de Ulloa’s prolonged absence from New Orelans, 
brought fresh criticism from the colonists, and he was soon dismissed (34). 
N.-J. Thiery de Menonville, a contemporary French botanist and traveler, 
said, “I have heard much fault found with Don Uloa [sic], but all the sub- 
jects of complaint that were alledged against him were charges of familiarity 
unworthy of his rank, and a shabby meanness in his domestic concerns. 
He has never given room for anyone accusing him of injustice or cruelty . . . 
his excessive patience made him to be despised and dismissed” (61). 

After serving for a time as commander of the fleet, de Ulloa returned to 
Spain. Joseph Townsend, a contemporary traveler, gave the following 
description of his visit to de Ulloa at Cadiz: “For my part, ... I chiefly 
associated with Spaniards. Among these the principal was Don Antonio 
Ulloa, the well known companion of D. Georg Juan .... I found him per- 
fectly the philosopher, sensible and well informed, lively in his conversa- 
tion, free and easy in his manners .... This great man, diminutive in 
stature, remarkably thin and bowed down with age, clad like a peasant, 
and surrounded by his numerous family of children, with the youngest, 
about two years old, playing on his knee, was sitting to receive morning 
visitors .... 

“The room was twenty feet long by fourteen wide, and less than eight 
feet high. In this I saw dispersed confused, chairs, tables, trunks, boxes, 
books, and papers, a bed, a press, umbrellas, clothes, carpenters’ tools, 
mathematical instruments, a barometer, a clock, guns, pictures, looking- 
glasses, fossils, minerals, and shells, his kettle, basons, broken jugs, Ameri- 
can antiquities, money, and a curious mummy from the Canary Islands 
.... When I went to take my leave of him, on quitting Cadiz, he pre- 
sented me with his Natural History of South America, a work highly de- 
serving to be translated” (62). 

De Ulloa died on Le6n Island near Cadiz on July 5, 1795. According to 
Sempere y Guarinos, he brought to Spain the first knowledge of electricity 
and artificial magnetism, and used a solar reflecting microscope, such as he 
had seen in England, to demonstrate the circulation of the blood in the ap- 
pendages of fish and various insects. From his jburneys, Ulloa brought 
back a knowledge of the cinnamon and rubber trees and of improvements 
in the arts of printing and binding. He also established the first cabinet 
of natural history and the first metallurgical laboratory in Madrid (58). 

About two years after the log of de Ulloa’s voyage had been published, 
Sir William Watson and Dr. William Brownrigg contributed to the Philo- 
sophical Transactions a more detailed description of platinum. William 



240 


Discovery of the Elements 


Brownrigg was born at High Close. Hall, Cumberland, on March 24, 1711. 
He studied medicine in London and later in Leyden under Boerhaave, 
Albinus, and W. J. s’Gravesande, and began to practise in Whitehaven ( 2 ), 
( 63 ), ( 64 ). 

A paper read by Watson before the Royal Society on December 13, 
1750, contained an excerpt from a letter, dated Whitehaven, December 5th 



; |* I take the freedom to indofe to you an account of *S*rWP*. 
called Pialim di Piute ; which, fo far at I know, hath not P*" <■*««•»- 
h Jataice of by any wriar on minerals. Mr Hill, who it one * TJJLt* 
offhe inofi modem, makes no mention ol it. Frefoming therefore 
tJjtf:fjubj*£ttm:w, I requrft the, favour of you to by this account before <■— 

*" be% them read and publifhed, if they thmkit deferring w/WRoyd 

'jfamfafif.l foould fooner have publifoed thir account, but waa~gg dt ^*> * 6, 
•ift hopes of finding leifure to make further experiment* oothfahod* » » TuJV 
*plpfojr««» an^ other “ - **- K ‘ — ' 


offindit . . 

cements ) alto noth Mercury, and ^ 

mtnfirm. But thefe experiment* I. ftuil now defer, until I mST^'v 
leam hOw the above is 'received.: The experiment* which t hxve related «7f°- *»f^ - 
of them made by a friend, whole exaftaeta in ew fo n p in g ?*•*** 
chess, and, vt*acity in rctoungthem, 1 can rely on s however, fef.groo-^TTj 

tut foyfidf ref*** them. . :v /.w*,!" 



.«** * o. f. k. s. t. wm. t x. s. omi w ai sto* »» Pse- 5 . • 

the! 
cultiv 

that, among the va 


> by the Modems i yet it ma&be&gf 
: variety of bodies which tft A ' 
cfoicnce, there ftili remain* room for new inquiries. 't*:WWtii4 
L that, among the great, and almoft inrxhaufhbte variqtie* w«ftiL 
,«d other concretes, new appearance*, ■ and mixture* ho- 
Ifoiaidd daily be difcovered : but. .that, .amoog i bp#im.^>.v'' : : 

among the: metalline t*jb*, ..... 

fpectrs fixfok) mil remain almoft wholly unknown to ■$} 
note ftrange,and‘exBf»Otdfoaty-:.: ; '> 
mt* pottoemi* of to 3 ** J 
' ‘ Of tbelateProfeffor 

HK ■ , 






Facsimile Page from Volume X of the Philosophical Transactions Abridgment 
Showing William Watson’s Description of Platinum and a Letter from Dr, 
Brownrigg on the Same Subject. 


of the same year, in which Dr. Brownrigg had mentioned some experi- 
ments which a friend of his had made on “the semi-metal called Platina di 
Pinto” (sic!), a substance which he had not found mentioned by any writer 
on minerals ( 65 ). Dr. Brownrigg regarded it as strange that such a simple 
substance “among the metalline tribe" should have remained unknown to 
naturalists. He pointed out that the principle, long accepted by assayers, 
that gold and silver may be purified from all other substances by cupella- 





Platinum 


241 


tion, did not apply to the new “semi-metal/’ for it, like gold, “resists the 
power of fire and the destructive force of lead/’ He added that this 
“platina” had been presented to him about nine years before by “a skilful 
and inquisitive metallurgist [Mr. Charles Wood] who met with it in Ja- 
maica, whither it had been brought from Carthagena” (Colombia). Dr. 
Brownrigg believed it probable that “there is great plenty of this semi- 
metal in the Spanish West 
. Indies, since trinkets made 
of it are there very common/ 7 
He mentioned its high melt- 
ing point and its refractori- 
ness toward borax and other 
saline fluxes. “But the 
Spaniards/’ said he, “have a 
way of melting it down, either 
alone or by means of some 
flux; and cast it into sword- 
hilts, buckles, snuff-boxes, 
and other utensils.” 

In about 1730, “Don Jorge 
de Villalonga, first viceroy of 
Santa F£, was given a guard 
for his rapier and some 
buckles of platina, but was 
assured that it had not been 
sufficiently joined or made to 
coalesce and that it was a 
brittle metal, but much 
heavier than the gold with 
which it was associated in the 
mines of the province of 
Citaro in the district of 
Chocd” (66). 


^ V ^ 3of^ S0la«)uer* 

Zctwt m m IWtx 

mrt* fcf Ut *. 

V; 


tt e r 


b tt & & 9 m f t 

nod) Drtnana. 

««» mit 

StoBwfHBjm w# wmfrt 

8*8 

3D* fconliarM 

In M k m* CHwwW mrrniMm MMtta r» 

mMm w* tom. 


frotpH m wrnwfcrt* &iri$a1x* 

ftjter ZWL 
Son * M * €. 


a tiPM* 

In ns* 


Sir William Watspn said Title Page of the German Edition of 
, t. , , ... , Macquer’s Chemical Dictionary 

that he had seen this sub- 

. .. . . Pierre-Joseph Macquer, 1718-1784, was one of 

stance mentioned by no other the g rst chemists to investigate platinum. 

author except de Ulloa. On 

February 13, 1750, Dr. Brownrigg wrote again to Watson, explaining that 
the experiments he had mentioned in his previous letter had been made by 
Mr. Charles Wood, who “was not ambitious of appearing in print,” but 
had permitted Dr. Brownrigg to report his results to the Royal Society. 

Dr. Brownrigg was always extremely modest about his discoveries, and 
preferred to live in comparative obscurity in Cumberland rather than to ac- 




242 


Discovery of the Elements 


cept the wider opportunities of London. He died at Ormathwaite on 
January 6, 1800. A writer in Gentleman's Magazine said of him, “The poor 

and the rich had everywhere some- 
what for which they thanked him, and 
health seemed only one of the bles- 
sings which he had to dispense” (64). 

Sir William Watson was a distin- 
guished physician, naturalist, and 
physicist. He was born in London on 
April 3, 1715, studied at the Merchant 
Taylors’ School, and became appren- 
ticed to an apothecary. He contrib- 
uted to the Philosophical Transactions 
a large number of original papers 
and many reviews of the work of other 



Antoine Baum£ , 

1728-1804 

French pharmacist and chemist. Au- 
thor of a “Chymie experimentale et rai- 
sonn£e” in which he discussed chemical 
apparatus, chemical affinity, fire, air, 
earth, water, sulfur, gypsum, alum, 
clay, niter, gunpowder, borax, arsenic, 
glass, porcelain, and the common acids, 
alkalies, metals, and ores used in 1773. 

His hydrometer scale is still used. He 
was one of the first chemists to investi- 
gate platinum. 

scientists. His long series of brilliant 
experimental researches on electricity 
brought him great renown. For 
many years he served as physician to 



the Foundling Hospital in London. 
He was knighted in 1786 and died on 
May 10th of the following year. 

The most distinguished chemists 
in Europe soon became intensely in- 
terested in platinum. Among those 
who published papers on it may be 
mentioned: H. T. Scheffer (42 ) , 
Bergman and Berzelius in Sweden; 
Lewis in England; Marggraf in Ger- 


Bbrtrand Pelletier 
1761-1797 

French chemist and pharmacist 
who investigated the arsenates, phos- 
phates, and phosphides of many met- 
als, studied the action of phosphorus 
on platinum, and devised new meth- 
ods for making soap and refining 
metal for clocks. He served as in- 
spector of the hospitals in Belgium. 
His son, Joseph Pelletier (1788-1842}, 
and Joseph Caventou discovered qui- 
nine, cinchonine, strychnine, and bru- 
cine. 


H. T. Scheffer 243 

many; and Macquer, Baum£, Buffon, Guyton, Delisle, Lavoisier, and B. 
Pelletier (43), in France. 

In 1752 H. T. Scheffer published a detailed scientific description of 
platinum, or “white gold/’ as he called it, and, with the aid of arsenic, suc- 
ceeded in fusing it (42). Henric Theophil Scheffer was born in Stockholm 
on December 28, 1710, where his father was secretary to the Royal Board 
of Mines. After serving an apprenticeship under Georg Brandt, he es- 
tablished his own laboratory and made trips to the mines to learn firsthand 
the close connection between smelting and assaying. 

In his eulogy, A. F. Cronstedt told the members of the Swedish Academy 
of Sciences how Scheffer became interested in platinum: “In his time,” 
said Cronstedt, “a new metal happened to be discovered, which had evi- 
dently not been found in two thousand years, and it was most fitting that 
the first investigation of such a rare substance should fall to this man who 
was worthy of it. 

“Your literary member, Herr Rudenskold [Ulrik Rudenschold, 1704- 
1765], brought this honor to him and to us; for no sooner had Mr. Watson 
in London let Herr Bose [Georg Matthias Bose, 1710-1761] in Wittenberg 
know that something resembling a metal of unknown properties had been 
brought over from America, under the name of Platina di Pinto , until Herr 
Rudenskold arranged to get some of it through his acquaintances in Spain. 

“The little bit that came,” said Cronstedt, “he handed over to Scheffer, 
who, driven by his customary zeal, soon solved the mystery of its nature, 
and showed in a paper that it was a peculiar metal, different from all 
others, almost infusible when alone, just as noble as gold, and less pliable. 
He anticipated Mr. Lewis, who made experiments on a greater quantity of 
it and later published the results of them in the Transactions of the British 
Scientific Society [Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society (67)]; 
but during the investigation neither was aware of the other’s manipulations 
and conclusions, wherefore each of them established a special property in 
addition to what they in all other respects found to be identical. 

“Our Scheffer,” said Cronstedt, “who rejoiced over this incontrovertible 
evidence, found, however, an error in denoting the specific gravity of the 
many alloys which Mr. Lewis prepared from platinum and other metals; 
wherefore he corrected them in the Handlingar of this Society in a manner 
which bears witness that the love of truth did not turn the head of the 
person who found it” (68). * 

Scheffer died on August 10, 1759. As Cronstedt said, “he sought dili- 
gently to follow the path that leads to the right goal after death; for he 
could not harbor the false doctrine that gold, which hinders and leads as- 
tray, or panaceas alleged to prolong life can serve as remuneration for 
piety” (68). 

In 1772 Baron Carl von Sickingen made extended researches on plat- 



244 


Discovery of the Elements 


inum and rendered it malleable by alloying it with silver and gold, dissolv- 
ing the alloy in aqua regia, precipitating the platinum with ammonium 
chloride, igniting the ammonium chloroplatinate, and hammering the re- 
sulting finely divided platinum to make it cohere (69). His researches on 
this subject were not published until 1782 (70). Two years later F. C. 
Achard prepared the first platinum crucible by fusing platinum with arsenic 
and volatilizing off the arsenic (69). 

The Marques de los Castillejos presented the Basque Society of Friends 
of their Country with a large quantity of platinum. The Extractos of this 
Society published William Lewis’s dissertation on this metal with the 
editorial note: “The Commission has made several tests according to this 
information and has succeeded in applying the use of this metal to the 
adornment of the handles of several razors and knives, giving it by ad- 
mixture various tints of golden or yellow color” (66). After a thorough 
investigation of this metal at the Vergara Seminary, Pierre-Fran^ois Cha- 
baneau (or Chavaneau) succeeded in making pure platinum malleable (66). 

Professor James Lewis Howe, author of an excellent bibliography of the 
metals of the platinum group, and Louis Quennessen, head of the firm of 
Des Moutis and Company, platinum refiners, have reviewed Chabaneau’s 
contributions (71), (72), (73). Chabaneau was born at Nontron, Dordogne, 
in 1754. An uncle, a monk of the order of St. Anthony, encouraged him to 
study theology. Although Chabaneau was brilliantly successful in his 
studies, metaphysical speculations were so distasteful to him that he an- 
tagonized his teachers and was expelled from the school. 

His penniless condition aroused the sympathy of the Abb6 La Rose, di- 
rector of a Jesuit college at Passy, who offered him the chair of mathe- 
matics. Although he scarcely knew arithmetic, Chabaneau, then only 
seventeen years old, was compelled by dire need to accept this unsuitable 
position. Studying by firelight every night in preparation for the next 
day’s teaching, he mastered arithmetic, algebra, and geometry, and soon 
became deeply interested in physics, natural history, and chemistry. 

At the age of twenty years he began to give a course of public lectures. 
Among his auditors were the sons of the Count of Peftaflorida, who had 
sent them to France to study and to select professors for the recently 
founded Vergara Seminary. They finally induced Chabaneau to go to 
Vergara to teach French and physics. 

Don Jos6 Celestino Mutis mentioned in 1774 two portrait medallions of 
the King made by#Don Francisco Benito, engraver at the Royal Mint in 
Santa F& [Colombia]. One of these was made of an alloy containing equal 
parts of copper and platinum, the other of pure platinum (74). Two letters 
of Don Fausto de Elhuyar, long preserved with the Mutis manuscripts at 
the Botanical Garden in Madrid, show that he collaborated with Chaba- 
neau in the researches on platinum. Writing from Vergara to his brother 



P.-F. Chabaneau 


245 


Don Juan Jos 6 in Bogota on March 17, 1786, Don Fausto described their 
process in detail, and estimated the value of platinum as less than that of 
silver. From the other letter, written from Paris to Don Juan Jos6 on 
May 19th of the same year, it is evident that Chabaneau and the two El- 
huyar brothers kept this process secret (75), (76). 

Soon after this, King Charles III created for Chabaneau a public chair of 
mineralogy, physics, and chemistry at Madrid, lodged him in one of the 
royal palaces, and provided him 
with a valuable library and a 
luxurious laboratory (72), (73). 

The Marques de Aranda had 
the government turn over its 
entire supply of platinum to 
Chabaneau for his difficult and 
puzzling researches. When 
Chabaneau removed the gold, 
mercury, lead, copper, iron, etc., 
he thought he had a single 
metal, platinum. As a matter 
of fact, however, he was still 
dealing with six metals, for rho- 
dium, palladium, osmium, irid- 
ium, and ruthenium had not yet 
been discovered. Small wonder 
that he oftentimes became dis- 
couraged by contradictory re- 
sults. Sometimes the platinum 
was malleable and at other times 
it was brittle (alloyed with ir- 
idium); sometimes it was in- 
combustible and nonvolatile and 
at other times (when an osmium 
alloy happened to be present) it 
burned and volatilized. 

When Chabaneau began to 
work on other subjects, the pa- 
tient Marques de Aranda encouraged him to turn hgain to the great re- 
search on “white gold.” Even when Chabaneau finally lost his temper 
and destroyed his apparatus and preparations, the Marques still urged him 
not to lose confidence. Three months later, the Marques found on a table 
in his home a ten-centimeter cube of metal. Attempting to pick it up, he 
said to Chabaneau, “You are joking. You have fastened it down/’ The 
little ingot weighed 23 'kilograms; it was malleable platinum! Although 



Jos6 Celbstino Mutis 
1732-1808 


Spanish botanist, physician, and ecclesiastic 
who devoted his life to studying the natural 
history of northern South America.' He in- 
vestigated the cinchona (or chinchona) forests 
of Colombia (New Granada) and collaborated 
with Don Juan Jos6 de Elhuyar in developing 
its mines. He stated that the gold in the ores 
of Choc6 cannot be spearated from the plati- 
num except by amalgamation (87). 


246 


Discovery of the Elements 


the Marques de Aranda had previously handled platinum only in the 
spongy form, Chabaneau had compressed a very pure platinum sponge, 
while hot, at the moment of its formation, and hammered it, while white 
hot, until it cohered. 

The King, who had often come to the laboratory to watch the progress 
of the experiments, had a commemorative medal struck in platinum, and 
granted Chabaneau a life pension on condition that he remain in Spain. 
The letters-patent bearing the date 1783 establish Chabaneau’s priority 
in this discovery (72). 

Realizing that the very infusibility of platinum would lend value to ob- 
jects made from it, Chabaneau and Don Joaquin Cabezas purified it, 
worked it, and carried on a lucrative business in the sale of platinum ingots 
and utensils. Thus began what Don Juan Fages y Virgili has called "the 
platinum age in Spain" (66). In 1799 Clavijo Fajardo, director of the 
Royal Laboratory of Natural History, asked the Minister for forty pounds 
of purified platinum and three arrobas (1 arroba = 25 pounds) of the 
native platinum grains for the use of Don Luis (Joseph-Louis) Proust for 
making crucibles and other utensils, and the government granted even 
more of it than was requested (66). Thus in a single laboratory in Madrid, 
"forty-six kilograms of platinum in grains and eighteen and one-half of the 
same purified were brought in in one day, that is to say, more platinum 
than we possess today [1909] in all the official laboratories in Spain" (66). 
Some of the platinum extracted from the gray sand which Don Antonio 
de Ulloa had brought from America was made into a magnificent com- 
munion cup for the chapel of the Royal Palace in Madrid (77). 

Late in life Chabaneau renounced his pension in order to seek rest and 
restoration of his health near his native village. He died in 1842 at the 
age of eighty-eight years. Jules Delanoue, a contemporary, described him 
as "a fine-looking old man, with pleasing and regular features, bearing 
much resemblance to those of our good and lamented B Granger. His con- 
versation was charming and always instructive. Friend and contemporary 
of Volney, of Cabanis, of Lavoisier, he was nourished upon their ideas and 
imbued with their spirit, and they were pleasingly reflected in his conver- 
sation" (72), (73). 

When Chabaneau took some of his ingots to Paris, M. Jeanety made 
from them some beautiful pieces of jewelry and became so interested that 
he gave up his craftm^nship in gold and silver to devote all his time to the 
working of platinum (78). Guyton-Morveau, Sir Joseph Banks, and some 
of the scientists in Sweden and the Netherlands ordered from him their 
platinum crucibles and ingots. Jeanety also made platinum snuff-boxes, 
watch-chains, spoons, toothpick boxes, blowpipes, and a set of buttons (78), 
(79). The prices were lower than for the corresponding articles in gold. 

In reporting Jeanety’s process to the French Bureau of Consultation in - 



Fusion of Platinum 


247 


1792, C.-L. Berthollet and Bertrand Pelletier stated that the gold from 
the No vita and Citaria mines north of Choc6 was separated from the plat- 
inum by sorting or by amalgamation. Since platinum could be used to al- 
loy and adulterate gold, and since such alloys resisted parting, the Spanish 
government ordered that the platinum be thrown into the rivers. “The 
Choc6 gold,” said Berthollet and Pelletier, “is then sent to be coined in the 
two mints at Santa F6, to those in Bogotd and Popaydn, where any plat- 
inum which may have remained with the gold is again sorted out. Royal 
officers guard it, and when there is a certain quantity of it, they come with 
witnesses to throw it into the Bogota River two leagues from Santa F 6 and 
into the Cauca River one league from Pop ay an. The platinum always 
occurs in little grains ; some of them, however, are quite large ; there is even 
one in the cabinet of the Vergara Academy of the size of a pigeon’s egg” 
(78). 

When J.-B. Boussingault had charge of the metallic mines of Colombia, 
the Congress of that country voted that a platinum equestrian statue of 
Bolivar be erected in Bogotd. Charged with the duty of executing this 
order, Boussingault drew up a report showing that the production of all 
the mines in the country would be insufficient for this purpose and that it 
would be impossible to cast a statue from this refractory metal. On the 
advice of a superior official, he withheld the report, however, and, to shield 
the lawmakers from embarrassment, merely agreed to carry out the com- 
mission to the best of his ability. When the Congress had had time to 
forget about the statue of Bolivar, the two kilograms of platinum which 
had been carefully saved were made into apparatus for the laboratory of 
chemical engineering (80). 

In 1801 Robert Hare, then only twenty years old, described before the 
Chemical Society of Philadelphia his oxyhydrogen blowpipe, with which he 
could fuse platinum. Two years later he reported to the American Philosoph- 
ical Society that he had succeeded in volatilizing this metal (81). Hare’s 
student, Joachim Bishop, later founded the American platinum refining 
industry (82). It was not until after the experiments of Wollaston, how- 
ever, that the working of platinum became easy (3). William Hyde 
Wollaston, the son of an Episcopal clergyman, was born at East Dereham, 
Norfolkshire, England on August 6, 1766. His childhood was not a lonely 
one, for he had fourteen active brothers and sisters. After studying at 
Cambridge, he received his medical degree at the "age of twenty-seven 
years. Although he practiced his profession for a time at Bury St. 
Edmunds,* he retired in 1800 and went to live in London, in order that 
he might devote all his time to physical science (4). 

For half a century after its discovery platinum had few uses because of 
the difficulty of working it. Dr. Wollaston found, however, that spongy 

* John Winthrop the Younger once attended grammar school at this place. 




Professor of chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania, At the age of twenty years he in- 
vented the oxy-hydrogcn, or compound, blowpipe, with which he fused and volatilized platinum 
and other refractory substances. He was most ingenious in devising chemical apparatus. 


W. H. Wollaston 


249 


platinum becomes malleable when strongly compressed and that it can be 
annealed and hammered. This process made possible the widespread 
use of the metal for laboratory apparatus, and the income from it enabled 
Wollaston to retire from his medical practice at the early age of thirty-four 
years and devote the rest of his life to scientific research. He specified the 
exact composition of the aqua regia which would dissolve the platinum 
without dissolving the iridium, and the proper method of expelling the 
ammonium chloride without making the fine particles of platinum cohere. 
The pulverizing was done with the hands and with a wooden mortar and 
pestle, for harder surfaces burnished the platinum so that it could not be 
welded. The powder was then thoroughly washed with water, and, while 
still wet, strongly compressed in a mould, heated in a wind furnace, and 
struck, while hot, with a heavy hammer. 

On April 22, 1813, Berzelius wrote from vStockholm to Dr. Marcet of 
London: 

When you see Dr. Wollaston give him a thousand compliments 
from me and then ask him if it would not be possible to have a little 
malleable platinum, not separated from its natural alloy with pallad- 
ium, rhodium, etc., to make a crucible. The crucibles I have bought 
recently from Cary are of a metal noticeably purer than those which 
I formerly had, and for that very reason infinitely more susceptible 
to attack by other substances (5). 

About two weeks later Dr. Marcet replied: 

Wollaston laughs at the idea that you want him to get you some 
impure platinum. He asks me to suggest that you alloy pure platinum 
with a little silver, as the surest means of increasing its durability ( 6 ). 

On February 24, 1829, Berzelius wrote to Eilhard Mitscherlich, “Wollas- 
ton's death grieves me. His specifications for making platina pliable were 
circulated at the same time as the news of his death. As I got iridium to 
cohere in an analogous manner, I was struck all the more by his simple 
method, went out into the laboratory, where I had a wet filter with platina 
on it, partly washed, which I pressed in a vice, dried, and ignited over a 
spirit lamp in a small platina crucible, and got it so coherent that it could 
no longer be broken with the fingers and could easily be cold-hammered. 
That’s as far as I have yet gone. That was ten minutes’ work, then I had 
to let it wait for a better time’* (S3). 

That Berzelius made good use of Wollaston’s process is evident from 
his letter to Wdhler written on May 1, 1829: 

We are now re-casting all our old soldered platinum crucibles by 
Wollaston’s method of making platinum pliable; it goes like a dance. 

I think Wollaston must have laughed inside over the many elaborate 
methods which have been used in vain for this purpose, when his is 
so simple. It seems that by heating the bottom of the crucible glow- 



250 Discovery of the Elements 

ing hot in Sefstrom’s forge, the formation of bubbles can be entirely 
prevented (7). 

In preparing solid platinum from its powder, Wollaston foreshadowed 
modern methods of powder metallurgy, by which the powders of refractory 


i 




Edgar Fahs Smith Memorial Collection, 
University of Pennsylvania 

A Page from Sbfstr6m’s Laboratory Notes* 

Translation; Cincliona reactions. 5 lbs. cortex Peruvian, first quality, with the 
sea captain Ripa from Amsterdam, belongs to Mazer and Co. Board of Health, minutes 
for Sept. 16, 1816. Bark very fine dark gray. Infusion clear, quite weak quinine taste, 
gave with iron solution a dark green precipitate. Antimony tartrate, very weak opales- 
cence. Infusion of nutgalls, very heavy white precipitate like that of gelatin and nut- 
galls. Gelatin solution, faint opalescence. It is no good. Stockholm, Sept. 22, 1816. 
N. G. Sefstrdm, M.D., Adjunct in Chemistry. 

* The writer is deeply grateful to Miss Mary Larson of the Zodlogy Department at 
The University of Kansas and to Mr. Einar Bourman for the translation of this letter 
from the Swedish and for assistance in securing Swedish illustrations. 



Platinum and Palladium 251 

metals, such as tungsten, molybdenum, tantalum, and columbium, can be 
fabricated into useful articles (84), (86). 

The technical working of massive platinum should be ascribed, however, 
to Thomas Cock, a brother-in-law of the platinum-refiner, P. N. Johnson, 
rather than to Wollaston. Cock worked out the process in William Allen’s 
laboratory at Plough Court and, at Allen’s request, communicated it to 
Wollaston (61). According to G. Matthey, P. N. Johnson was the first 
to manufacture platinum on a commercial scale and the first to prepare a 
large and perfect sheet of the pure 
metal. James Lewis Howe has stated 
that Chabaneau’s process was redis- 
covered by Knight and possibly also 
by Cock (72). 

In his lectures in 1817, W. T. Brande 
stated that platinum “may be con- 
sidered as the exclusive product of 
South America" (46). In 1819, how- 
ever, a white metal was observed in 
the gold placers op the eastern, or 
Siberian, slopes of the Urals, south of 
Ekaterinburg (Sverdlovsk) (69). In 
1822 I. I. Varvinskij, director of the 
Gold-smelting Laboratory of Ekaterin- 
burg, showed that it contained plati- 
num, and V. V. Liubarskij, an assayer 
of St. Petersburg, later proved it to be 
osmiridium. In 1824 platinum was dis- 
covered north of Ekaterinburg in the 
Urals (36). The late B. N. Menschut- From Berzelius' ,( Lehrbuch der CherniS' 
kin published in the Journal of Chemi- N. G. Sefstrom’s Portable Eight- 

cal Education an excellent historical Fig 20 v£K£*k». ' Fig. 21 . 
sketch of the Russian platinum (36). Transverse section. 

I„ 1828 the' Rnssian government , r 

authorized the coinage of large amounts of dust-free wood charcoal as fuel, 
of Siberian platinum acquired from SefstrSm melted platinura in this forge. 

Count Demidoff (85). 

Palladium 

As early as 1700, or more than a century before palladium was dis- 
covered, Brazilian miners became familiar with a natural alloy which they 
called prata (silver), ouro pddre (worthless, or spoiled gold), or ouro branco 
(white gold) (44). In about 1780 a silver-white gold bar at the Sabari 
smelting-house broke into several pieces under the impact of the die. 




252 


Discovery of the Elements 


This gold had come from St. Anna dos Ferros, near Itabira do Dentro, 
Minas (44). In 1798 Josi Vieira do Couto mentioned several localities in 
Brazil where a silver-white “platinum” was to be found. This was prob- 
ably the alloy palladium-gold. 

In 1803 Dr. Wollaston succeeded in separating two new metals from 
platinum. He dissolved the crude metal in aqua regia, evaporated off 
the excess acid and added a solution of mercurous cyanide, drop by 
drop, until a yellow precipitate appeared. When this substance was washed 
and ignited, a white metal remained. By heating the yellow precipitate 
with sulfur and borax he also succeeded in obtaining a button of the new 
metal, which he named palladium in honor of the recently discovered 
asteroid, Pallas (6). 



From Berzelius f ** Lehrbuch der Chemie ” 

Bellows Used with SefstrOm’s Forge 


The first knowledge that the London public received of this discovery 
was an anonymous handbill offering the metal for sale. The humorous 
and pathetic story of the young Irish chemist, Richard Chenevix (8), who 
believed the new metal to be fraudulent and who tried to prove that it was 
a platinu m amalgam, has been told by White and Friedman in the 
Journal of Chemical Education (21). 

In 1809-10 Joseph Cloud, chemical director of the Philadelphia Mint, 
discovered an alloy of gold and palladium in two ingots of gold from Brazil 
(48), (49). Although this alloy contained no easily oxidizable metal, silver, 
nor platinum, he obtained from it a button of palladium. Since palladium 
had previously been obtained only from impure platinum, some chemists 
may still have believed with Richard Chenevix that it must be an alloy of ■ 



Palladium and Rhodium 


253 


platinum. Cloud's isolation from the platinum-free ingots of a metal 
which proved to be identical with Dr. Wollaston's palladium afforded 
strong evidence that the latter must be an individual metal and not an al- 
loy of platinum (50). 

When the gold bars from Gongo-Soco, Brazil, first began to come to 
England, the Mint refused to accept them because of their brittleness. 
The famous platinum refiner Percival Norton Johnson assayed them, how- 
ever, detected the palladium, and perfected a process for refining and 
toughening the Brazilian gold (51), (52). In 1837 he presented specimens 
of palladium-gold, palladium ammonium chloride, and palladium metal 
to W. A. Lampadius of the Freiberg School of Mines. According to Lampa- 
dius, “Palladium has not been separated from the Brazilian gold until the 
last four years, but since that time Mr. Johnson, who had worked on palla- 
dium a great deal with the late Wollaston, has given the owners of the 
aforementioned gold mine a method of parting by means of which the gold 
is produced pure, and the separated palladium put to many other uses .... 
The palladium thus produced, alloyed with 20 per cent silver, is now used 
in London as metal for dentists, also for making scales for sextants and 
other astronomical instruments. Alloyed with copper, it gives a composi- 
tion which makes steel more elastic. Even earlier, a watchmaker, Bennet, 
specified an alloy of 24 palladium, 44 silver, 72 gold, and 92 copper for 
bearings for chronometers” (52). 

Johnson separated the pallad um from an enormous quantity of the 
Gongo-Soco gold, and in 1845 supplied the Royal Geological Society of 
London with a sufficient quantity of this metal for the casting of the Wollas- 
ton Medal (44). Johnson was always considerate of the miners, and sin- 
cerely devoted to their welfare. He spent much of his time and fortune 
on the schools which he erected near the mines (51). 

Rhodium 

Dr. Wollaston dissolved another portion of crude platinum in aqua regia, 
and neutralized the excess acid with caustic soda. He then added sal am- 
moniac to precipitate the platinum as ammonium chloroplatinate, and 
mercurous cyanide to precipitate the palladium as palladious cyanide. 
After filtering off the precipitate, he decomposed the excess mercurous 
cyanide in the filtrate by adding hydrochloric acid and evaporating to dry- 
ness. When he washed the residue with alcohol, eveVything dissolved ex- 
cept a beautiful dark red powder, which proved to be a double chloride of 
sodium and a new metal (3), which, because of the rose color of its salts, 
Dr. Wollaston named rhodium (9). He found that the sodium rhodium 
chloride could be easily reduced by heating it in a current of hydrogen, 
and that after the sodium chloride had been washed out, the rhodium 
remained as a metallic powder. He also obtained a rhodium button. 



254 


Discovery of the Elements 


Thomas Thomson relates that Dr. Wollaston had amazingly keen vision 
and remarkably steady hands. He could write on glass with a diamond 
in clear, well-formed letters which were so small that other persons could 
read them only with a microscope (4) . 

That Berzelius was well acquainted with Dr. Wollaston and held him in 
high esteem may be seen from his letter to Berthollet written in London in 
October, 1812: 



William Hyde Wollaston 
1766-1828 

English chemist and physicist. Dis- 
coverer of palladium and rhodium. In- 
ventor of a process for making platinum 
malleable. Famous for his researches 
on force of percussion, gout, diabetes, 
columbium, tantalum, and titanium, 
and his scale of chemical equivalents. 


My stay here [said Berzelius] has 
been most interesting and instruc- 
tive in furnishing me a quantity of 
chemical resources of which I for- 
merly had no idea. But what I 
value most of all is the personal ac- 
quaintance of the admirable Wol- 
laston and the brilliant Davy. I am 
sure that among the chemists who 
are at present in the prime of life 
there is none that can be compared 
with Wollaston in mental depth and 
accuracy as well as in resourceful- 
ness, and all this is combined in 
him with gentle manners and true 
modesty. I have profited more by 
an hour’s conversation with him 
than frequently by the reading of 
large printed volumes. . . . Sim- 
plicity, clarity, and the greatest ap- 
pearance of truth are always the ac- 
companiments of his reasoning (5). 

In the diary which he kept on this 
visit to England, Berzelius wrote, 


Dr. Wollaston, Secretary of the 
Royal Society, known through his 
numerous discoveries in chemistry and physics, is a man between 
forty and fifty years old, of very pleasant appearance, very polished 
manners, plainness and clearness in his conversation, interest in his 
slightest gesture, and with such a spirit of justice and gifted with such 
moderation in his views that it has become a common proverb that 
whoever argues with Wollaston is wrong (30). 


The letters of Dr. Marcet to Berzelius give us a pleasing picture of Dr. 
Wollaston's friendly nature. On May 24, 1814, Dr. Marcet wrote: 

Would you believe it, my dear friend, that while your kind and 
interesting letter of April 12th was on its way to London, I was oc- 
cupied with friend Wollaston in enjoying all the dissipations of Paris. 
One fine morning, near the end of April, Wollaston came into my house 



W. H. Wollaston 


255 


and said to me: “I have curious news for you.” “What!” I replied, 
“Has Bonaparte returned to Paris?” “No,” he said, “it is even more 
curious than that. ... I am going to Paris tomorrow, and you are one 
of the party.” I rubbed my eyes, thinking I was dreaming; but he 
finally proved to me that it was not a dream; and as everything 
Wollaston says is 
gospel (Sir John 
Sebright has nick- 
named him “The 
Pope”), I immedi- 
ately told my wife 
that fate was cal- 
ling me to Paris for 
a fortnight, gave a 
good dose to each 
of my patients, and 
left (10). 

Sir Edward Thorpe 
gives quite a different 
picture of Wollaston, 
however, when he says, 

He resembled 
Cavendish in tem- 
perament and men- 
tal habitudes, and, 
like him, was dis- 
tinguished for the 
range and exacti- 
tude of his scien- 
tific knowledge, his 
habitual caution, 
and his cold and re- 
served disposition 

HD. 

On another occasion 
Dr. Marcet wrote, “The 
excellent Wollaston has 
just lost his father, who 
leaves a large fortune, 
which I dare to reply, 
will not spoil our 
friend 1 ' (12). On Janu- 
ary 23, 1816, he suggested in reply to a question asked by Berzelius, 

If you wish to send Wollaston a present in the name of the prince, 
the only idea that comes to me is a fine hunting gun of your splendid 
Swedish steel. The dear Doctor, pope that he is, has taken seriously to 



From Figuier’s “Vies des Savants Mushes'* 

Georgbs-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, 1707-1788 
French naturalist famous for his beautiful literary 
style. Founder of the Jardin des Plantes. Author of a 
“Natural History” in forty-four volumes, in which he dis- 
cussed insects, birds, quadrupeds, minerals, the theory 
of the earth, and the epochs dt Nature. One of the 
first to investigate platinum. 


256 


Discovery of the Elements 


hunting, and already acquits himself with much success. The fact 

is he does not know how to do anything poorly (10). 

Dr. Wollaston was a man of very broad interests, as a list of his publica- 
tions will show. His papers were on such diverse subjects as: force of 
percussion, fairy rings, gout, diabetes, seasickness, metallic titanium, the 
identity of columbium and tantalum, a reflection goniometer, micrometers, 
barometers, a scale of chemical equivalents, and the finite extent of the 
atmosphere. He died in London on December 22, 1828 (13). 

Osmium and Iridium 

Smithson Tennant, the discoverer of osmium and iridium, like Dr. 
Wollaston, was the son of a clergyman. He was born in Wensleydale, 
near Richmond, Yorkshire, on November 30, 1761. At the age of nine 
years he had the misfortune to lose his father, and not many years later he 
witnessed the tragic death of his mother, who, while riding with him, was 
thrown from her horse and instantly killed. Tennant’s elementary educa- 
tion was fragmentary, but even when very young he was fond of reading 
chemical books and performing experiments. When he was only nine 
years old he made some gunpowder ^for fireworks (14). 

In 1781 he went to Edinburgh to study under the famous chemist and 
physician Dr. Black, and in the following year he entered Christ’s College, 
Cambridge, where he studied chemistry, botany, mathematics, and New- 
ton’s “Principia.” His room at college was a scene of confusion: books, 
papers, and chemical apparatus littered the floor, and his indolent and un- 
systematic habits were indeed a serious handicap throughout his scientific 
career (15). 

When he was twenty-three years old, he traveled through Denmark and 
Sweden, where he met the famous Scheele, and for the rest of his life he 
delighted in showing his English friends the minerals that the great Swedish 
chemist had given him on this occasion. Tennant also traveled through 
France and the Netherlands and met the most eminent chemists of those 
countries. Berzelius said that Tennant always carried in his pocket a map 
of Sweden which had become worn and soiled through years of use and that 
he spoke French '‘gladly and well” (30 ) . He received his degree of Doctor 
of Medicine from Cambridge in 1796, but never practiced. 

In the same year he proved by an ingenious experiment that the diamond 
consists solely of carbon. This he did by burning a weighed diamond by 
heating it with saltpeter in a gold tube. The carbon dioxide united with 
the potash in the saltpeter, and was later evolved. Most chemists would 
have felt deep concern over the outcome of such a costly and important 
experiment, but Tennant went horseback riding at his usual hour, leaving 
the results to the mercy of his assistant. However, since the assistant was 



Smithson Tennant 257 

no other than the gifted William Hyde Wollaston, the outcome was success- 
ful (14), (16). 

In 1803 Tennant found that when crude platinum is dissolved in dilute 
aqua regia, there remains a black powder with a metallic luster. This 
had been observed before and was thought to be graphite, but Tennant 
investigated it carefully in an attempt to alloy lead with it, and concluded 
that it contained a new metal (17). In the autumn of the same year Collet- 
Descotils, a friend and pupil of Vauquelin, found that this powder contains 
a metal which gives a red color to the precipitate from an ammoniacal 
platinum solution (18). When Vauquelin treated the powder with alkali 
he obtained a volatile oxide which he believed to be that of the same metal 
with which Descotils was dealing (19). 

In the meantime Tennant continued his researches, and the results 
which he communicated to the Royal Academy in the spring of 1804 
showed that the powder contains two new metals, which may be separated 
by the alternate action of acid and alkali. One of these he named iridium 
because its salts are of varied colors, and the other one he called osmium 
because of its odor (. 20 ). 

These discoveries may best be described in his own words : 

Upon making some experiments, last summer, on the black powder 
which remains after the solution of platina, I observed that it did not, 
as was generally believed, consist chiefly of plumbago, but contained 
some unknown metallic ingredients. Intending to repeat my experi- 
ments with more attention during the winter, I mentioned the result 
of them to Sir Joseph Banks, together with my intention of com- 
municating to the Royal Society my examination of this substance, 
as soon as it should appear in any degree satisfactory. 

Two memoirs were afterward published in France [continued 
Tennant] one of them by M. Descotils and the other by Messrs. Vau- 
quelin and Fourcroy. M. Descotils chiefly directs his attention to 
the effects produced by this substance on the solutions of platina. 
He remarks that a small portion of it is always taken up by nitro- 
muriatic acid during its action on platina; and, principally from the 
observations he is thence enabled to make, he infers that it contains a 
new metal, which, among other properties, has that of giving a deep 
red colour to the precipitates of platina. M. Vauquelin attempted a 
more direct analysis of the substance, and obtained from it the same 
metal as that discovered by M. Descotils. But neither of these chem- 
ists have observed that it contains also another metal, different from 
any hitherto known. . . . 

Tennant gave the name iridium to the metal which Descotils and 
Vauquelin had observed, and the name osmium to the new one (20). 
In speaking of iridium, osmium, palladium, and rhodium, W. T. Brande 
stated in his lectures in 1817, “Of these, the two former were discovered by 
the late Mr. Tennant and the two latter by Dr. Wollaston; and had we 



258 


Discovery of the Elements 


searched throughout chemistry for an illustrative instance of the delicacy 
of the modern art of analysis, it would be difficult to have found any one 
more notorious than the history of the discovery and separation of these 
bodies exhibits” (46). During the entire course of the researches which 
led to the discovery of these four metals, Dr. Wollaston and Tennant had 
friendly intercourse with each other, and each kept in close touch with the 
other’s work. As a brief relaxation from their scientific labors, they visited 
the Giants’ Causeway together. 

Smithson Tennant had a most kind and forgiving nature. When a 
dishonest steward on his estate, who had become so heavily in debt that 
Tennant was obliged to examine the accounts, committed suicide, Tennant 
not only excused the unfortunate family from the payment of the debt, but 
assisted them financially in the kindest possible manner (14). 

Tennant, like Wollaston, enjoyed the esteem and friendship of the great 
Swedish master, Berzelius, who paid him a visit in the summer of 1812. 
Together they rode on horseback to inspect the 100-acre experimental oat 
field in which Tennant had mixed lime with the soil in decreasing ratio from 
one end to the other (31). After he had shown Berzelius the tall, well- 
developed oats at the highly limed end and the sickly plants at the other 
end of the field, they visited the lime-kiln wffiich Tennant himself had de- 
signed (30). 

Berzelius may perhaps have envied the English chemist’s horsemanship, 
lor, after receiving the Cross of the Order of the Northern Star, he said in a 
letter to Dr. Marcet, “Here I am then a kind of cavalier, I whose manner of 
mounting a horse Tennant can describe to you”* (24). In a letter to J. G. 
Gahn, Berzelius wrote: “Tennant is of about the same age as Wollaston, 
but is gray-haired and looks like an old man. He is a charming man, gets 
off a lot of droll ideas which entertain any sort of society, scientific or other- 
wise. He is a rather good, reliable chemist, but doesn’t have either Wollas- 
ton’s or Davy’s head; and now he has lost much of his memory, so that 
one can tell him the same thing on two successive days with full assurance 
that it will be new to him. He is badly dressed, is careless of his appear- 
ance, and makes a poor showing. His chemicals are so helter skelter that 
he gets permission to pull out all the table drawers in the parlor to convince 
himself of the absence of what one would never expect to find except in a 
laboratory” (53) 

In May, 1813, Dr. Marcet wrote to Berzelius, “Our friend Tennant has 
just been elected professor of chemistry at Cambridge after a very long 
struggle with a candidate who had many friends. His position demands 
that he give twenty lectures a year, which will not be very difficult for him 
(22). Berzelius replied, “Congratulate Tennant for me on his new profes- 

* "Me voili done une esp£ce de chevalier, moi, dont Tennant pent vous apprendre 
comment je monte & cheval.” 



Death of Tennant 259 

sion and tell him that we expect from his hands the life of Newton more cor- 
rect than we have yet seen it” (23). 

Tennant was destined to give his lecture course at Cambridge only once, 
for his life was cut short by a tragic accident, the following account of 
which was written by Dr. Marcet to Berzelius on March 29, 1815: 


You have doubtless learned of the tragic death of poor Tennant. 

I was often on the point of writing you, but the grief of being the 
first to tell you this story restrained me. He had spent six months 
in France and was returning loaded with curious observations in ge- 
ology, chemistry, political economy, etc. He had, it is said, discov- 
ered in sea water the source and origin of iodine. He announced him- 
self every week for a month or so, and nevertheless did not come. 
Quite like himself, he clung to all the objects along the way, and ad- 
vanced only very slowly. He finally arrives at Calais, then at Bou- 
logne, and after having spent about fifteen days between these two 
places while waiting for a perfectly favorable wind, he finally sets 
sail. But a calm arises and they are obliged to return to port. Our 
friend seeks to console himself for this disappointment by taking a 
horseback ride; he proposes to a Prussian officer who was on board 
with him that they go together to see a column erected to Bonaparte 
a few miles from Boulogne. 

They had to pass over a little draw-bridge [continued Dr. Marcet]. 
The officer goes over first, but as soon as he is on the bridge he notices 
it pivoting on its center and that it is going to open into the ditch. 
He cries to Tennant, “Don’t come any farther,” and at the same time 
rushes on to re-establish equilibrium, but it was too late; he feels 
that another force is pressing on the bridge and forcing it to an inclined 
plane. . . he slides back with his horse and falls from twelve to fifteen 
feet into the ditch. Recovered from his shock, he looks around him 
and sees poor Tennant lying against the wall at the end of the ditch 
with his horse writhing on top of him. He pushes the horse away, 
lifts our friend, and finds him dying. . . . Who would have thought 
that our friend would die while visiting a work of war, of which you 
know he had the greatest horror. You well know, and I have no need 
to tell you, all that his friends, all that science, have lost. He was a 
unique man and one who will probably never be replaced. He loved 
you dearly, and I know you will mourn him sincerely (24). 

Tennant had “an expressive, intelligent face. . .an intuitive and prompt 
perception of truth ... a broad mind, deep moral feelings, and a zeal for 
the improvement of mankind” (15). He delighted*in the artistic achieve- 
ments of Virgil, Milton, Pascal, Gray, Handel, and Raphael. His never- 
failing sense of humor consisted in “fanciful trains of imagery, in natural, 
but ingenious and unexpected, turns of thought and expression, and in 
amusing anecdotes, slightly tinged with the ludicrous. The effect of these 
was heightened by a perfect gravity of countenance, a qiiiet, familiar 
manner, and a characteristic beauty and simplicity of language” (15). 



260 Discovery of the Elements 

Ruthenium 

The element ruthenium is the little Benjamin of the platinum family. 
It did not see the light until more than a century after the discovery of 
platinum, but, to avoid separating it too far from its older brothers, its 
story will be told here. 

In 1828 Berzelius and G. W. Osann (25), professor of chemistry at the 
University of Dorpat, Russia, examined the residues left after dissolving 
crude platinum from the Ural mountains in aqua regia. Berzelius did not 
find in them any unusual metals except palladium, rhodium, osmium, and 
iridium, which had already been found by Wollaston and Tennant in simi- 
lar residues from American platinum. 
Professor Osann, on the other hand, 
thought that he had found three new 
metals, which he named pluranium, 
ruthenium, and polinium (25), (36). 
In 1844, however, Professor Klaus, an- 
other Russian chemist, showed that 
Osann’s ruthenium oxide was very im- 
pure, but that it did contain a small 
amount of a new metal (26), (33). 

Karl Karlovich Klaus* spent his 
infancy and boyhood in a harsh, un- 
kind environment, f He was born in 
the Baltic-Russian city of Dorpat§ 
on January 23, 1796. His father, a 
talented painter whose pictures later 
adorned Klaus’s library, died in 1800. 
Soon after her husband’s death the 
mother married another artist, and she, 
in turn, died when the boy was only 
five years old. Her second husband 
soon married again, and thus the little 
boy found himself a strange child in a 
strange home, left without affection and almost without care (36). 

Klaus soon showed ability in design and sculpture, and his love for art, 
poetry, and drama helped him at times to forget the none-too-gentle home 

* The name is frequently written Carl Ernst Claus. It is a German name, not a 
Russian one. 

t Most of the details regarding the life of Klaus would have been inaccessible 
without the kind assistance of Mr. M. K. Elias of the Kansas State Geological Survey, 
who translated Menschutkin's biographical sketch from the Russian. The author is 
sincerely grateful to him. 

$ This city is located in Esthonia, and is now known as Tartu. 



Courtesy Mr. W. D. Trow 

Karl Karlovich Klaus, 1796-1864 
Professor of pharmacy and chem- 
istry at the Universities of Dorpat 
and Kazan. He was a great authority 
on the chemistry of the platinum 
metals. 


Karl Karlovich Klaus 


261 


surroundings. He attended the grade school and gymnasium in Dorpat, 
but was unable, in spite bf his excellent record, to complete the course at the 
latter institution. However, the praise given by his teachers stimulated 
him to further efforts which, even at this early age, revealed the funda- 
mental features of his character: resoluteness, optimism, and a desire to 
reach at any cost a once-attempted goal. As a boy he enjoyed the few 
bright aspects of his cheerless life, and as an adult he never complained of 
the sufferings of his chilc$hood. 

When forced to earn his own living at the age of fourteen years, he be- 
came an apprentice in a pharmacy in St. Petersburg. Here he spent his 
spare moments reading books on chemistry, pharmacy, and allied sciences. 
These attempts at self-education were so successful that Klaus was soon 
able to pass the examinations, first for assistant pharmacist and then for 
the position of provisor (36). 

In 1815 he went back to Dorpat, passed the pharmacy examinations at 
the University, and returned to the St. Petersburg apothecary. His study 
of the natural sciences having awakened in him a desire to study Nature at 
first hand, he went to Saratov in 1817 as pro visor of a pharmacy so that 
he might spend his leisure hours investigating the flora and fauna of the 
Volga steppes, or prairies, in eastern Russia. The results of this ten-year 
research were published in the Russian journals. 

After his marriage in 1821 Klaus longed to have an apothecary shop of 
his own, and five years later he began business in Kazan, where he soon had 
the best pharmacy in the town. Here, with more adequate financial re- 
sources, he continued his study of the flora and fauna. He soon became 
recognized as an authority on that subject, and his advice was sought when- 
ever a scientific expedition was to be sent into the steppes. This brought 
him into contact with many famous scientists, who always carried away a 
pleasant recollection of his modesty and willingness to cooperate. The 
expedition which he himself made in 1827 through the region between the 
Urals and the Volga afforded material for his large book entitled ‘‘Volga 
Flora” (36). 

When an assistantship in the chemistry department of the University of 
Dorpat was offered to him in 1831, Klaus sold his store at a loss, made the 
long trip back to Esthonia, and accepted the modest position, in order to 
devote all his time to scientific research. While completing the work for 
his master's degree in chemistry, he found time to explore with Gobel and 
A. Bergmann the Trans-Volga salt marshes and to prepare all the sketches 
for a large, two-volume record of the expedition, which was published at 
Dorpat in 1837 and 1838. In recognition of this work he was awarded 
the Demidoff prize. 

Wishing to return to Kazan, he applied to the Secretary of Public Instruc- 
tion for a position at the University. The Secretary approved the applies- 



262 


Discovery of the Elements 


tion, but only after listening to a trial lecture which Klaus was required 
to deliver at the Medico-Surgical Academy of St. Petersburg (36). 

Upon returning to Kazan as adjunct in chemistry, he entered enthusiasti- 
cally into the work of remodeling the old chemical museum into a chemical 
laboratory. Klaus also succeeded in getting six additional rooms in a 
newly completed university building. These were arranged like Liebig’s 
laboratory at Giessen, and included a large lecture room, well equipped 
for demonstration experiments. He was granted an appropriation of about 
10,000 rubles ($5000) for the purchase of glassware, reagents, and ap- 
paratus. 

In 1838 Klaus, with his student assistant Kabalerov, made an analysis 
of the water from the Sergievsky Mineral Springs, which provided the 
data for his dissertation for the doctorate in pharmacy. Immediately after 
receiving this degree, he was made extraordinary professor at the Uni- 
versity, and six years later he was promoted to the position of ordinary 
professor. 

In 1840 Klaus became interested in platinum residues. The reader, will 
recall that in 1828 Professor G. W. Osann of Dorpat University had an- 
nounced the presence in these residues of three new metals, the existence of 
which Berzelius had denied. Professor Klaus wished to settle this question, 
and the first step in his investigation was a careful repetition of Osann ’s 
work. He obtained two pounds of platinum residues from P. G. Sobo- 
Ievsky, a platinum refiner in St. Petersburg, and was surprised to find 
that they contained 10% of platinum, besides smaller amounts of os- 
mium, iridium, palladium, and rhodium. In his report one may read, 

The unexpected richness of the residues, great quantities of which 
lie unused at the laboratory of the Government Mint at St. Peters- 
burg, appeared to me so important that I immediately reported the 
results of my investigation to the government mining authorities, 
and in 1842 I went to the capitol (36). 

In St. Petersburg he interviewed Count Egar F. Kankrin, the Secretary 
of the Treasury who introduced platinum coinage in Russia. Kankrin 
expressed complete approval of Professor Klaus’s investigation, and Chev- 
kin, the chief of the staff of mining engineers, presented him with twenty 
pounds of the platinum residues. 

The working of these residues did not prove as profitable as Professor 
Klaus had hoped, for, as he said : 

These residues were poorer than the first, and thus my hope of adapt- 
ing my method for profitable extraction ©f platinum from them was 
not fulfilled. There remained only an investigation interesting for 
science. Since I came to realize this two years ago, I have worked 
constantly on this hard, prolonged, and even unhealthful investiga- 
tion; now I report to the scientific world the results obtained: (l) 



Ruthenium 


263 


results of analysis of rich residues; (2) new methods for the separation 
of the metals of the platinum group; (3) methods for working up poor 
residues; (4) discovery of a new metal, ruthenium; (5) results of the 
analysis of poor residues and the simplest methods of decomposition of 
platinum ores and residues; (6) new properties and compounds of 
the previously known metals of the platinum group. All this may 
serve as a contribution to the chemical history of the precious metals of 
our fatherland (36). 

Klaus obtained the new metal from osmiridium, the portion of the crude 
platinum which is insoluble in aqua regia. He calcined a mixture of 
osmiridium, potash, and potassium nitrate in a silver crucible placed inside 
a Hessian crucible on a layer of magnesia (27). After heating it for an 
hour and a half at bright redness, he poured the molten contents into an 
iron capsule. He then took up the melt in a very large volume of water, 
and allowed it to stand four days in the dark in a completely filled 
bottle. 

The orange-colored solution, containing, among other things, potassium 
ruthenate, was treated with nitric acid, whereupon a black precipitate of 
osmium dioxide containing from fifteen to twenty per cent of ruthenium 
oxide was thrown down as a velvety deposit. Klaus distilled this with 
aqua regia, taking care to condense the osmium tetroxide. The residue 
remaining after the distillation consisted mainly of the sesquichloride and 
tetrachloride of ruthenium. By adding ammonium chloride, Klaus pre- 
pared ammonium chlororuthenate, (NH^RuCle, a salt which upon 
calcination yields spongy ruthenium (27) } (38). 

This report, which was entitled “Chemical investigation of the residues 
of ural platinum ore and of the metal ruthenium,” occupied one hundred 
and eighty-eight pages in the Sdentific Annals of Kazan University for 
1844. In the following year it was published in book form. For patriotic 
reasons and also in recognition of the earlier work of Professor Osann, 
Klaus retained the name ruthenium , which means Russia . The white 
substance which Osann had taken for the oxide of this new metal consisted 
chiefly of silicic and titanic acids, iron peroxide, and zirconia. The new 
metal had escaped him because he had repeatedly treated this insoluble 
material with hydrochloric acid without examining the solution (37). 

When Professor Klaus sent a sample of the new metal to Berzelius, the 
great Swedish master was skeptical* On January *21, 1845, he remarked 
in a letter to Wohler: 

Probably Klaus's experiments on the residues from platinum ores 
and on the new metal ruthenium have already been described in the 
German journals. He sent me his paper in manuscript. You see 
thereby that he has also prepared colorless salts of iridium with sul- 
furous acid The early severe winter in November interrupted the 



264 


Discovery of the Elements 


postal communication between Ystad and Stralsund, so that I have not 
received the German journals for three months (28). 

In the meantime Klaus continued 
his investigation of the compounds of 
ruthenium, specimens of which he sent 
to Stockholm, one after another, with 
detailed descriptions of their properties 
and the methods of preparation. This 
evidence was so convincing that in 
1845 Berzelius announced in the 
Jahresbericht his acceptance of ru- 
thenium as a new element (36), (37). 

On March 9, 1846, he again men- 
tioned Klaus’s paper to Wohler, saying : 

Klaus in Kazan has sent me a 
resume (Nachernte) concerning ru- 
thenium, which I expect to read 
tomorrow at the Academy and 
which you shall then receive in 
the Ofversigten. It is strange 
that he does not publish his longer 
paper. A copy of it has been 
in my hands since November, 
1844. Yet he surely cannot have 
intended that I should publish it. 

At least he has never said a word 
about it. . . . 

Berzelius finally suggested to Klaus that he send the ruthenium paper 
to Wohler for publication in the A nnalen , and it may now be seen in Volume 
63 of that journal (29), (38). 

All of Klaus’s papers on the platinum metals were collected and published 
in 1854 in a Jubilee Volume issued in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of the 
founding of the University of Kazan. He continued to teach inorganic, 
analytical, and organic chemistry, and was assisted for a time in the organic 
course by Nikolai Nikolayevich Zinin and in the inorganic course by Alex- 
ander Michaylovich Butlerov. 

In 1852 Klaus was invited to occupy the chair of pharmacy at the Uni- 
versity of Dorpat and to take charge of the Pharmaceutic Institute, at that 
time the only institution of its kind in all Russia. He accepted the appoint- 
ment, left his position at Kazan in charge of Butlerov, abandoned the 
long-cherished Steppes of the Volga, and made the long trip back to 
Esthonia. 

At Dorpat he continued his investigation of the platinum metals and 
their alloys. After devoting twenty years to research in this field, he 



J. Henri Dbbray 
1827-1888 

French chemist who collaborated 
with Henri Sainte- Claire Deville at 
the Ecole Normale Superieure in re- 
searches on gaseous dissociation. He 
also investigated beryllium, molyb- 
denum, tungsten, and the metals of the 
platinum group, and made contribu- 
tions to synthetic mineralogy. It was 
in Debray’s laboratory that Moissan 
liberated fluorine. 



Literature Cited 


205 


wished to publish a monograph which should include not only his own 
researches but those of other scientists. In 1863 the Russian government 
sent him to western Europe to visit the laboratories and platinum refineries 
and to study the history of the platinum metals in the libraries of the great 
scientific centers. Klaus’s achievements were so well known that he was 
honored wherever he went. In Berlin he met Heinrich and Gustav Rose, 
Poggendorff, and Magnus, and in Paris he studied the electric furnaces of 
Henri Sainte-Claire Deville and H. Debray (36). 

Professor Klaus returned to Dorpat in January, 1864, with a wealth of 
material for the monograph on the platinum group, but illness unfortu- 
nately overtook him, and the work was never completed. He passed away 
on March 24, 1864, loved and respected by his students and colleagues.* In 
his last public address before the Pharmaceutical Society of St. Petersburg, 
he emphasized the desirability of providing scholarships for needy students 

m- 


Literature Cited 

(2) Priestley, J., “Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air,” J. 
Johnson, London, 1774, p. xvii. 

( 2 ) Dixon, “Biographical account of William Brownrigg, M.D.,” Annals of Phil., 10, 
321-38, 401-17 (Nov., Dec., 1817). 

(3) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
402-5. 

(4) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” Vol. 2, Colburn and Bentley, 
London, 1831, pp. 246-50. 

(5) SdDERBAUM, H. G., “Jac Berzelius Bref,” Vol. 1, part 3, Almqvist and Wiksells, 
Upsala, 1912-1914, pp. 40-2. 

(6) Ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, p. 47. 

(7) Wallach, O., “Briefwechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wdhler,” Vol. 1, Verlag 
von Wilhelm Engelmann, Leipzig, 1901, p. 253. 

(5) “Reward of twenty pounds for the artificial production of palladium,” Nichol- 
son's J., 7, 75 (Jan., 1804); R. Chenevix, “Enquiry concerning the nature of a 
metallic substance lately sold in London as a new metal, under the title of palla- 
dium,” ibid., 7, 85-101 (Feb., 1804); 176-82 (Mar., 1804); Letter from Wollaston 
to Nicholson concerning Pd, ibid., 10,204-5 (Mar., 1805); T. Thomson, “History 
of Chemistry,” ref. (4), Vol. 2, p. 217. 

(9) Wollaston, W. H., “On a new metal fotind in crude platina,” Nicholson's J., 
10, 34-42 (Jan., 1805). 

(10) SOdbrbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref,” ref. (5). Vol. 1. part 3, p. 98. 

( 11 ) Thorpe, T. E., “ftistory of Chemistry,” Vol. 1, G. P. Putnam’s Sons, London, 
1909-1910, p. 114. 

( 12 ) SOdbrbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref,” ref. (5), VoL 1, part 3, pp. 128-9. 

( 13 ) Poggendorff, J. C., “Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichte 
der exakten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Articles on Wollaston and Claus. 


* According to the Russian calendar Klaus was bom on Jan. 11, 1796, and died on 
March 12, 1864. 



266 


Discovery of the Elements 


(14) Thomson, T., “History of Chemistry," ref. ( 4 ), Vol. 2, pp. 232-40. 

(15) “Some account of the late Smithson Tennant, Esq.,” Annals of Phil., 6 , 1-11 
(July, 1815); 81-100 (Aug., 1815); Gentleman's Mag., 117, 281 (Mar., 1815). 

(16) Tennant, S., “On the nature of the diamond,' 1 Nicholson's J., 1, 177-9 (July, 
1797). 

(17) “Discovery of two new metals in crude platina by Smithson Tennant, Esq., 
F.R.S.," ibid., 8, 220-1 (July, 1804). 

(18) Collet-Descotils, H.-V., “On the cause of the different colours of the triple 
salts of platina, and on the existence of a new metallic substance in the metal," 
ibid., 8, 118-26 (June, 1804). 

’(2*9) Vauqublin, N.-L., “M6moire sur l'iridiuni et 1'osmium, m6taux qui se trouvent 
dans le residu insoluble de la mine de platine, traitee par l'acide nitromuriatique," 
Ann. thim. phys., (1), 89, 150-81 (Feb., 1814); 225-50 (Mar., 1814). 

(20) Tennant, S., “On two metals, found in the black powder remaining after the 
solution of platina," Nicholson's J., 10, 24-30 (Jan., 1805). 

(21) White, A. M. and H. B. Friedman, “On the discovery of palladium," J. Chem. 
Educ., 9, 236-45 (Feb., 1932) 

(22) SOderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref," ref. (5), Vol. 1, part 3, p. 46. 

(23) Ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, p. 61. 

(24) Ibid., Vol. 1, part 3, pp. 117-9. 

(25) “New metals in the Uralian platina," Phil. Mag., 2, 391 (Nov., 1827). 

(26) Brown, J. C., “History of Chemistry," P. Blakiston's Son, Philadelphia, 1913, 
p. 523. 

(27) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie," ref. (3), Vol. 2, pp. 406-7. 

(28) Wallach, O., “Briefwechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler," ref. (7), Vol. 

2. p. 520. 

(29) Ibid., Vol. 2, p. 580. 

(»??) “Aus Berzelius's Tagebuch wtibrend seines Aufenthaltes in London im Sommer 
1812," translated into German by Emilie Wdhler, Z. angew. Chem., 18, 1946-8 
(Dec., 1905) and 19, 187-90 (Feb., 1906). 

( V2) Tennant, S., “On the different sorts of lirne used in agriculture," Nicholson's J., 

3, 440-6 (Jan., 1800). 

(32) St. John, “The Lives of Celebrated Travellers," Vol. 2, J. & J. Harper, New York, 
1832, pp. 320-38. Chapter on de Ulloa. 

(33) Klaus, K. K., “Ruthenium, ein neues Metall der Platinerze," Ann., 56, 257-61 
(Heft 3, 1846). 

(34) Dimitry, “A king's gift," Mag. Am. History, 16, 308-16 (Oct., 1886). 

(35) Ogburn, S. C., “The platinum metals," J. Chem. Educ., 5, 1371-84 (Nov., 1928). 

(36) Menschutkin, B. N., “Karl Karlovich Klaus," Ann. inst. platine (Leningrad), 
No. 6, 1-10 (1928); “Discovery and early history of platinum in Russia," J. 
Chem. Educ., 11, 226-9 (Apr., 1934). 

(37) “On the new metal ruthenium," Phil. Mag., (3), 27, 230-1 (Sept., 1845). 

(38) Klaus, K. K., “Mine de platine; osmium, ruthenium," J. Pharm. Chim., (3), 8, 
381-5 (Nov., 1845); “Beitrage zur Chemie der Platinmetalle," Ann., 63, 337-60 
(Heft 3, 1847). 

(39) Farabbb, W. C. f “A golden hoard from Ecuador," Museum Journal, University 
of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, 12, 43-52 (1921), 

(40) Bergs0e, P., “The metallurgy of gold and platinum among the pre-Columbian 
Indians," Ingeni0rvidenskabelige Skrifter No. A44, Danmarks Naturviden- 
skabelige Samfund, Copenhagen, 1937, 48 pp.; Nature, 137, 29 (Jan. 4, 1936); 
ibid,, 139, 490 (March 20, 1937). 



Literature Cited 267 

(41) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Chemie,” Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 1847, 
Vol. 4, pp. 220-6. 

(42) Scheffer, H. T., “Das weisse Gold oder siebente Metall, in Spanien Platina del 
Pinto, Kleines Silber von Pinto genannt, seiner Natur nach beschrieben," Crell's 
Neues chem. Archiv, 5, 103-6 (1786); Chem. Abh. konigl. schw. Akad., 1752, pp. 
275-82. 

(43) Pelletier, Bertrand, “M6moires et observations de Chimie," Paris, 1798 (an 
VI), Vol. 2, pp. 120-133. “Rapport fait au Bureau de Consultation sur les 
Moyens proposes par M. Jeanety pour travailler le platine (Juillet, 1792), par 
MM. Berthollet et Pelletier. " 

(44) Hussak, Eugen, “Uber das Vorkommen von Palladium und Platin in Brasilien,” 
Sitzungsber. math.-naturwiss. Klasse, Akad . Wiss. (Wien), 113,379-466 (1904). 

(45) Baruel, “Process for procuring pure platinum, palladium, rhodium, iridium, and 
osmium from the ores of platinum/’ Quarterly J. Sci. t 12, 262 (1822); N.-L. 
Vauquelin, “M£moire sur le palladium et le rhodium,’ 1 Ann. chim. phys. (1), 88, 
170-1 (Nov. 30, 1813). 

(46) “Report of Mr. Brande's lectures on rnineralogical chemistry,” Quarterly J . Sci., 
5, 64-7 (181 8). 

(47) Fonda, J. S., “Historic set of weights,” Hexagon, 15, 81-2 (Nov., 1924); J. Chem. 
Educ., 2, 308 (Apr., 1925). 

(48) Del Rio, A. M. “Analysis of a specimen of gold found to be alloyed with rho- 
dium,” Am. J. Sci., 11, 298-304 (1826); Ann. chim. phys. (2), 29, 137-47 (1825). 

(49) Cloud, J., “On the discovery of palladium in a native alloy of gold,” Nicholson's 
J. (2), 30, 137-40 (Oct., 1811); Trans. Am. Philos. Soc., 6, 407 (1809). 

(50) Smith, K. F., “Chemistry in Old Philadelphia,” J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia, 
1919, pp. 86-8. 

(51) Mattuey, G., “Obituary of Percival Norton Johnson,” J. Chem. Soc., 20, 395 
(1867); Proc. Roy. Soc. (London), 16, xxiii-xxv (1867-8). 

(52) Johnson, P. N. and W. A. Lampadius, “Uber brasilianisches Palladgold und des- 
sen Ausbringung und Scheidung,” J. prakt. Chem., 11, 309-15 (1837). 

(55) Soderbaum, H. G.,ref. (5), Vol. 9, p. 73. Letterof Berzelius to Gahn, Jan. 25, 1813 

(54) “Julii Caesaris Scaligeri, Exotericarum exercitationum Liber XV de Subtilitate 
ad Hieronymum Cardanum,” apud Claudium Maraium & haeredes Joannis 
Aubrii, Francofurti, MDCVII, pp. 323-4. 

(55) de Ulloa, A. “Relacibn Historica del Viage a la America Meridional," Antonio 
Marin, Madrid, 1748, Vol. 1, book 6, chap. 10, p. 606. 

(56) Juan, Jorge and Antonio de Ulloa, “A Voyage to South America,” Lockyer 
Davis, London, 1772, Vol. 1, pp. 131-2, 452-3; Vol. 2, pp. 417-8. 

(57) Pinkerton, John, “A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting Voy- 
ages and Travels," Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orrne, London, 1812, Vol. 14, p. 
540. De Ulloa's “Voyage to South America.” 

(58) Sempere y Guarinos, J., “Ensayo de Una Bibliotec# Espafiola de los Mejores 
Escritores del Reynado de Carlos III," Imprenta Real, Madrid, 1789, Vol. 6, 
pp. 15&-76. 

(59) de Villibrs du Terragb, Bon Marc “Les Derni&res Annies de la Louisiane 
franpaise," E. Guilmoto, Paris, 1903, pp. 225-326, 398, 415. 

(60) Phelps, Albert, “Louisiana, a Record of Expansion," Houghton, Mifflin and 
Co., Boston and New York, 1905, pp. 108-23. 

(61) Pinkerton, John,. ref. (57), Vol. 13, p. 786. N. J. Thiery de Menonville’s “Trav- 
els to Guaxaca." 



268 Discovery of the Elements 

(62) Townsend, Joseph, “A Journey through Spain in the Years 1786-7,” James 
Moore, Dublin, 1792, 3rd ed., Vol. 2, pp. 152-3. 

(63) Stephen, Leslie, “Dictionary of National Biography,” Smith, Elder and Co., 
London, 1886, Vol. 7, pp. 85-6. Article on Brownrigg by G. T. Bettany. 

(64) Obituary of Brownrigg, Gentleman’s Mag., 70, 386-8 (1800). 

(65) Watson, William, “Several papers concerning a new semi-metal called platina,” 
Phil. Trans. Abridgment , 10, 671-6 (1756); Phil. Trans., 46, 584-96 (Nov., 1750). 

(66) “Discurso del Ilmo. Sr. D. Juan Fages y Virgili,” Establecimiento Tipogr&fico y 
Editorial, Madrid, 1909, pp. 41-3, 57-61. 

(67) Lewis, William, “Experimental examination of a white metallic substance said 
to be found in the gold mines of the Spanish West Indies . . . ,” Phil. Trans., 
48 (2), 313-38 (1754). 

(68) Cronstbdt, A. F., “Aminnelse-tal ofver . . . Henric Theoph. Scheffer,” Lars 
r Salvius, Stockholm, 1760, 31 pp. 

(6.9) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Chemie,” Fr. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig* 1847, 
Vol. 4, pp. 220-6. 

(70) von Crell, L. “Review of Baron von Sickingen’s Versuche uber die Platina,” 
Crell’s Neueste Entdeckungen, 6, 197-206 (1782). 

(71) Howe, J. L., “Bibliography of the metals of the platinum group, 1748-1896,” 
Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, 38, 1-318 (1897). 

(72) Howe, J. L., “Chabaneau: an early worker on platinum,” Pop. Set. Mo., 84, 
64-70 (Jan., 1914). 

(73) Qubnnessen, Louis, “A propos de l’histoire du platine. Pierre Francois Chaban- 
eau, 1754-1842,” Rev. Sci.. 52 (1), 5.*-7 (1914). 

(74) Maffbi, E., and R. Rua Figueroa, “Apuntes para una Biblioteca Espahola . . . 
de las Riquezas Minerales . . . J. M. Lapuente, Madrid, 1873, Vol. 2, p. 625; 
Manuscript letter of J. C. Mutis dated June 15, 1774. 

(75) “El primer centenario de D. Fausto de Elhuyar,” Anales Soc. Espafi. de Fisica y 
Quimica , 31, 7-23 (1933). 

(76) de GAlvez-Ca^ero, A., “Apuntes Biogrdficas de D. Fausto de Elhuyar y de 
Zubice,” Gr&ficas Reunidas, Madrid, 1933, pp. 62-70. 

(77) Diergart, Paul, “Beitrage aus der Geschichte der Chemie dem Gedachtnis von 
G. W. A. Kahlbaum,” Franz Deuticke, Leipzig and Vienna, 1909, p. 412. 

(78) Pelletier, Charles and S6dillot Jeune, “M6moires et Observations de 
Chimie de Bertrand Pelletier,” Croullebois, Fuchs, Barrois, and Huzard, Paris, 
1798, Vol. 2, pp. 120-33. 

(79) CrelVs Ann., 14, 53-4 (1790). 

(80) Lacroix, Alfred, “Figures de Savants,” Gauthier- Villars, Paris, 1932, Vol. 2, 
pp. 144-6. 

(81) Hare, Robert, “Account of the fusion of strontites and volatilization of plati- 
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(82) Smith, E. F., “Life of Robert Hare,” J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia and Lon- 
don, 1917, pp. 5-6, 204-5. 

(83) SOderbaum, H. G., ref. (5), Vol. 13, p. 132. Letter of Berzelius to E. Mitscherlich, 
Feb. 24, 1829. 

(84) “Laboratory of powder metallurgy established at Stevens Institute of Technol- 
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(85) “Russian coinage of platina,” Phil. Mag. (2), 4, 458 (Dec., 1828). 

(86) Kelly, F. C., “Powder metallurgy,” Sci. Mo„ 57, 286-8 (Sept., 1943). 

(87) Weeks, M. E., “Don Jos4 Celestino Mutis, 1732-1808,” J. Chbm. Educ., 21, 55 
(Feb., 1944). 



XV. THREE ALKALI METALS: POTASSIUM, SODIUM, 
AND LITHIUM 


A number of the chemical elements , including some that play an important 
role in modern life , remained practically unknown outside the scientific world 
for many years after their discovery . Some, like tellurium, vanadium, and 
titanium , were forgotten for several decades even by chemists , and were later 
rediscovered. The reader will recall , however , that when phosphorus was 
discovered in 1669 the news spread rapidly throughout Europe . In a similar 
manner Davy's isolation of sodium and potassium immediately fired the 
imagination of the nineteenth-century public and aroused intense interest. 
These elements , like phosphorus , made their entrance upon the chemical stage 
in a manner nothing short of dramatic , and the accompanying phenomenon oj 
light helped to focus all eyes upon them. Lithium , however , entered the chemi- 
cal world in a more quiet manner and was introduced by a scientist of lesser 
prominence , J. A. Arfwedson, a student of Berzelius. 


There is now before us a boundless prospect of novelty 
in science; a country unexplored , but noble and fertile 
in aspect; a land of promise in philosophy (I). 

Potassium and Sodium 

Ancient writers did not distinguish between sodium carbonate (the min- 
eral alkali) and potassium carbonate (the vegetable alkali) (42). When 
Johann Bohn prepared aqua regia in 1683 by distilling a mixture of salt 
and aqua fortis (nitric acid), he noticed that the cubic crystals which re- 
mained differed from those of saltpeter prepared in the ordinary manner 
from wood ashes. This clear distinction between “cubic saltpeter” (sodium 
nitrate) and ordinary saltpeter was an important step in the proof that 
soda and potash are two different alkalies. In the latter part of the eight- 
eenth century, Torbem Bergman wrote: “There are to this day persons 
who insist that the vegetable alkali cannot be exhibited in form of crystals, 
notwithstanding that Professor Bohnius (Diss. Physico Chym., ann . 1696, 
pa. 381) of Leipsic, so long ago as the end of the last century, had demon- 
strated the contrary; but his method had been so long unknown that it was 
lately offered to the public as a new discovery” (42), (43), (44). 

In speaking of the loss to both chemistry and medicine by too narrow 
specialization in either science, Hermann Boerhaave once wrote, “What 
praise then is not merited by Jean Bohn and Frederic Hoffmann, who excel 
in both and who thereby acquired such a great reputation” (45). 

George Ernst Stahl distinguished between the “natural and artificial 
alkalies” (soda and potash) as early as 1702, and noted that certain sodium 



270 


Discovery of the Elements 


salts differ in crystalline form from those of potassium (42). Hermann 
Kopp quoted a passage from the “Specimen Becherianum” in which Stahl 
stated that the natural alkali (soda) in common salt appeared in the re- 
tort after distillation with concentrated oil of vitriol or spirit of niter (sul- 
furic or nitric acid) in the form of new salts differing from the corresponding 
salts of the artificial alkali (potash) in their crystalline form, solubility in 

Henri-Louis du Hamel du Monceau 
(or Dumonceau) proved conclusively 
in 1736 that the mineral alkali (soda) 
is a constituent of common salt, ol 
Glauber’s salt, and of borax. He was 
bom in Paris in 1700 and educated at 
Harcourt College. Even before his 
election to membership, the Academy 
of Sciences selected him to study a dis- 
ease which was threatening the saffron 
crop in G&tinois. Du Hamel found the 
cause of it to be a parasitic plant, and 
decided to devote his life to scientific 
agriculture and the public welfare (50). 

Although the acidic constituent of 
common salt was already known, the 
nature of its basic constituent was 
still a matter of conjecture. “Soda, 
natrum, and borax,” wrote du Hamel 
in 1736, “give with vitriolic acid Glau- 
ber’s salt; with acid of saltpeter, cubic 
saltpeter [sodium nitrate]; and with 
acid of salt, a kind of sea salt. Does 
this not permit one to decide as to the 
base of the sea salt?” (46). 

He prepared soda from salt by two 
methods. In the first of these, he 
evaporated a mixture of salt and oil of vitriol, heated the resulting Glau- 
ber’s salt with charcoal dust in a closed crucible, distilled the reduced mix- 
ture with wine vinegar, and calcined the hard, black residue of sodium ace- 
tate left in the broken retort. In his other method, he poured concentrated 
Spirit of saltpeter (nitric acid) on the salt, and distilled off the resulting 
aqua regia. After repeating the distillation four times, he exploded the 
residue of cubic saltpeter (sodium nitrate) with charcoal dust in a red-hot 
crucible. On dissolving the residue, he obtained “the crystalline salt of an 
alkali, as in the foregoing process” (46). He concluded that “soda is cer- 


water, and behavior toward heat. 



Gal. franf., IS 23. 

Drouais phe pinx., H. Grevedon del. 


Henri-Louis du Hamel 
{or Duhamel) du Monceau 

1700-1782 

French chemist and agriculturist who 
proved in 1736 that the mineral alkali 
(soda) is a constituent of common salt, 
of Glauber’s salt, and of borax. With 
his brother, M. de Denainvilliers, he 
carried out important experiments in 
plant nutrition on their estate. 


Du Hamel Du Monceau 271 

tainly nothing other than the true base of sea salt; this is shown by the 
habitat of soda plants’' (46). 

In an attempt to find out whether the presence of soda or potash de- 
pended on a specific difference in the plants which produce them or on the 
composition of the soils, du Hamel devoted many years to agricultural 
experiments, at his estate at Denainvilliers, on the culture of the common 
saltwort ( Salsola kali), a plant used for the manufacture of soda ash. The 
final analyses of the ash of this plant proved that in the first year the min- 
eral alkali still predominated, but that in succeeding years the vegetable 
alkali rapidly increased until finally, after a few generations, the soda had 
almost disappeared (50). In these experiments, he had for many years the 
invaluable and enthusiastic help of his brother, M. de Denainvilliers. In 
his eulogy of du Hamel in the History of the Academy of Sciences, the 
Marquis de Condorcet gave the following characterizations of the two 
brothers: 

While M. du Hamel wrote his books, consulted with scientists, kept 
up a correspondence with the most enlightened men in Europe, en- 
gaged in new scientific researches, and planned his experiments and 
observations, M. de Denainvilliers carried out, in his retreat, the ob- 
servations and experiments which his brother had entrusted to him, 
always unknown and content to be so. . .asking no other recompense 
than the pleasure of having done good. To judge M. du Hamel, one 
would have to see him at Denainvilliers, the fields covered with exotic 
productions which were enriching growers whose fathers had not 
known even the names of these useful and salutary plants,. . . forests 
filled with exotic trees brought from all countries of the globe, . . .all 
the instruments invented for observing nature and studying her laws, 
distributed in the mansions, in the gardens, in the parks; and in the 
midst of all these objects of instruction, two men united by the love of 
the good, different in character as in occupation. . .(50). 

In his books, M. du Hamel reported his own experiments and their re- 
sults, and also included much elementary information for the use of prac- 
tical farmers. “At the age of fifty years,” said Condorcet, “he was one of 
the best informed men in Europe in all the scientific branches with the ap- 
plications of which he later occupied himself almost exclusively. . .and if 
he has often been justly cited to show what use scholars ought to make of 
their learning, one can also prove by his example that, in order rightfully 
to aspire to the honor of making the sciences useful, one must be very 
learned” (50). M. du Hamel “kept all his life the principles of religion he 
had received in his childhood; . . .to serve humankind, to penetrate nature’s 
marvels, and to ascribe them to their Author, seemed to him, for a scientist 
and citizen, the most fitting exercise of piety” (50). He lived tranquilly 
with his nephews, one of whom shared his scientific labors. After the death 
of M. de Denainvilliers, these nephews and a niece relieved M. du Hamel of 
all domestic cares. He lived to be eighty-two years old. 



272 


Discovery of the Elements 


Georg Brandt in 1746 prepared both crystalline and amorphous sodium 
carbonate and observed that the latter is not hygroscopic and that it 
crystallizes more readily than does potassium carbonate {47). 

In 1758-59 A. S. Marggraf prepared very pure cubic saltpeter from com- 
mon salt. “After cooling the vessel and breaking the retort/’ said he, “I 
found in it a saline substance which took fire on glowing charcoal, without 
the slightest crackling (just as ordinary saltpeter does when very pure) 
and, as the chemists say, detonated, but with the difference that the flame 
was yellow; for that with ordinary prismatic niter is usually whitish” {48). 
In his next paper, which was entitled “Proof that the alkaline part sepa- 
rated from common salt is a true alkaline salt and not an alkaline earth,” 
he mentioned the yellow flash of gunpowder made with cubic saltpeter 
and the blue (violet) flash of that made with prismatic saltpeter {48). 

Although chemists had long suspected that the alkaline earths are metal- 
lic oxides, the true nature of soda and potash was not surmised before 
the early nineteenth century {28). Lavoisier believed that they might 
contain nitrogen : 

Up to the present [said he] the principal constituents of soda are no 
better known than those of potash. We are not even certain whether 
or not that substance is already formed in vegetables before combus- 
tion. Analogy might lead us to believe that nitrogen is one of the 
principal constituents of alkalies in general, and we have the proof of 
it in the case of ammonia, as I shall explain; but as far as potash and 
soda are concerned, we have only slight presumptions, not yet con- 
firmed by any decisive experiment {29). 

In his list of elements Lavoisier mentioned thirty-three substances: 


light 

muriatic radical 

copper 

platinum 

caloric 

fluoric radical 

tin 

lead 

oxygen 

boric radical 

iron 

tungsten 

nitrogen 

antimony 

manganese 

zinc 

hydrogen 

silver 

mercury 

lime 

sulfur 

arsenic 

molybdenum 

magnesia 

phosphorus 

bismuth 

nickel 

baryta 

carbon 

cobalt 

gold 

alumina 

silica 


In commenting on this list he said, “I have not included in this table the 
fixed alkalies, such as potash and soda, because these substances are 
evidently compound, although however the nature of the principles which 
enter into their composition is still unknown” {30). The chemical nature 
of these common alkalies remained unknown until the beginning of the 
nineteenth century, when the brilliant young English chemist, Humphry 
Davy succeeded in decomposing both of them with his voltaic pile. 

High above an azure bay on the rugged coast of Cornwall there rises 
lofty St. Michael’s Mount, a gigantic rock surmounted by an ancient 



Sir Humphry Davy 


273 


turreted castle. The nearby town of Penzance in Mount’s Bay may sug- 
gest to lovers of light opera the adventurous pirates of Gilbert and Sullivan, 
but chemists revere it as the birthplace of Sir Humphry Davy, who once 
gave the following vivid picture of the scene so dear to him: 


The sober eve with purple 
bright 

Sheds o'er the hills her 
tranquil light 
In many a lingering 

, ra y ; 

The radiance trembles on 
the deep , 

Where rises rough thy 
rugged steep , 

Old Michael, from the 
sea . 

A round thy base, in azure 
pride. 

Flows the silver-crested 
tide , 

In gently winding 
waves; 

The Zephyr creeps thy 
cliffs around , — 

Thy cliffs, with whispering 
ivy crown'd , — 

And murmurs in thy 
caves (2). 

Humphry Davy was 
born on December 17, 
1778. He was a healthy, 
active, affectionate child, 
who made many friends 
by his knack of telling 
stories and reciting origi- 
nal verses. His teacher, 
Dr. Cardew, said the 



Sir Humphry Davy 
1778-1829 

English chemist and physicist. One of the founders 
of electrochemistry. Inventor of the safety lamp for 
miners. He was the first to isolate potassium, 
sodium, calcium, barium, strontium, and magnesium. 
Davy in England and Gay-Lussac and Thenard in 
France, working independently, were the first to 
isolate boron. 


boy’s best work was done in translating the classics into English verse {3). 
Davy’s schooling ended when he was only fifteen years old, but his educa- 


tion continued for the rest of his life. In 1795 he was apprenticed to 
Bingham Borlase, a surgeon and apothecary in Penzance, and two years 
later he began to study natural philosophy and chemistry (20). His 


textbook was Lavoisier’s 4 ’Elements of Chemistry," his reagents were 


the mineral acids and the alkalies* and his apparatus consisted largely 
of wine glasses and tobacco pipes. When he was twenty years old Davy 



274 


Discovery of the Elements 


became superintendent of the Pneumatic Institution which Dr. Beddoes 
had recently established at Clifton for studying the medicinal value of 
gases. He was most happy in sharing the delightful home life of Dr. 
Beddoes and the social contacts with such distinguished literary men as 
Southey and Coleridge (4). 



Electrochemical Apparatus of Sir Humphry 
Davy 

Fig. 1. Agate cups. 

Fig. 2. Gold cones. 

Fig. 3. Glass tubes. 

Fig. 4. The two glass tubes with the inter- 
mediate vessel. 


In 1801 Count Rumford 
obtained for Davy a position 
as assistant lecturer on chem- 
istry and director of the lab- 
oratory at the Royal Insti- 
tution. In the Philosophical 
Magazine one finds the fol- 
lowing description of his first 
lecture, which was on gal- 
vanism : 

Sir Joseph Banks, 
Count Rumford and 
other distinguished phi- 
losophers were present. 
The audience was highly 
gratified, and testified 
their satisfaction by gen- 
eral applause. Mr. 
Davy, who appears to 
be very young, acquitted 
himself admirably well. 
From the sparkling in- 
telligence of his eye, his 
animated manner, and 
the tout ensemble, we 
have no doubt of his at- 
taining distinguished ex- 
cellence (5). 

Literary persons and the 
members of fashionable soci- 
ety, as well as scientists, 
flocked to his lectures. 


In all the figures, AB denote the wires, one posi- Davy kept a careful record of 
tive and one negative; and C\the connecting „ .. . , * 

pieces of mpistened amianthus. l 118 experiments and 

showed it willingly to all who 
were interested. He remained with the Royal Institution for eleven 
years, and then retired at the time of his marriage. 

Humphry Davy's greatest successes were in the field of electrochemistry. 
In his first attempts to decompose the caustic alkalies, he used saturated 
aqueous solutions, but succeeded in decomposing nothing but the water. 



Isolation of Potassium 


275 


On October 6, 1807, however, he changed his plan of attack. “The pres- 
ence of water appearing thus to prevent any decomposition,” said he, 
“I used potash in igneous fusion” (22), (23), (26). 

To his great surprise he noticed intense light at the negative pole and a 
column of flame rising from the point of contact. When he reversed the 
current the flame came always from the negative pole. Since perfectly 
dry potash is a non-conductor, Davy gave it a brief exposure to the air : 

A small piece of potash [said he], which had been exposed for a few 
seconds to the atmosphere so as to give conducting power to the sur- 
face, was placed upon an insulated disc of platina, connected with the 
negative side of the battery of the power of 250 of 6 and 4, in a state 
of intense activity; and a platina wire, communicating with the posi- 
tive side, was brought in contact with the upper surface of the alkali. 
The whole apparatus was in the open atmosphere. 

Under these circumstances [said 
Davy] a vivid action was soon 
observed to take place. The pot- 
ash began to fuse at both its points 
of electrization. There was a vio- 
lent effervescence at the upper 
surface; at the lower, or negative, 
surface, there was no liberation of 
elastic fluid; but small globules 
having a high metallic lustre, and 
being precisely similar in visible 
characters to quicksilver, appeared, 
some of which burnt with explosion 
and bright flame, as soon as they 
were formed, and others remained, 
and were merely tarnished, and 
finally covered by a white film 
which formed on their surfaces. 

These globules, numerous experi- 
ments soon shewed to be the sub- 
stance I was in search of, and a 
peculiar inflammable principle the 
basis of potash. I found that the 
platina was in no way connected 
with the result, except as the me- 
dium for exhibiting the electrical 
powers of decomposition; and a 
substance of the same kind was 
produced when pieces of copper, 
silver, gold, plumbago, or even charcoal were employed for compleat- 
ing the circuit. 

The little metallic globules always appeared at the cathode, and these 
had an astonishing way of bursting into flame when thrown into water. 
They skimmed about excitedly with a hissing sound, and soon burned with a 



Dr. Thomas Beddoes 
1760-1808 


English physician and chemist. 
Founder of the Pneumatic Institu- 
tion at Clifton for studying the 
therapeutic value of gases. Sir 
Humphry Davy became the super- 
intendent of* this institution at the 
age of twenty years. 


276 


Discovery of the Elements 


lovely lavender light. Davy found that the new metal liberated hydrogen 
from the water and that the flame was caused by the burning of this gas 
(6), (23), Because he had obtained the metal from potash, he named it 
potassium . Dr. John Davy, who was present when potassium was isolated 

for the first time, said that 



Apparatus of Sir Humphry Davy 

Fig. 1 . Retort of plate glass for heating potas- 
sium in gases. 

Fig. 2. Platinum tray for receiving the potas- 
sium. 

Fig. 3. Platinum tube for receiving the tray 
in distillation experiments. 1 

Fig. 4. Apparatus for taking the voltaic 
spark in sulfur and phosphorus. 


his brother became greatly 
excited and almost delirious 
with joy (7), (19). 

Humphry Davy then at- 
tempted to decompose caustic 
soda by a similar method, 
and found that a larger cur- 
rent was required (6), or, as 
he himself expressed it, that 
“the decomposition de- 
manded greater intensity of 
action in the batteries, or the 
alkali was required to be in 
much thinner and smaller 
pieces 

With the battery of 
100 of 6 inches in full 
activity [he explained] 

I obtained good results 
from pieces of potash 
weighing from 40 to 70 
grains, and of a thick- 
ness which made the dis- 
tance of the electrified 
metallic surfaces nearly 
a quarter of an inch ; but 
with a similar power it 
was impossible to pro- 
duce the effects of de- 
composition on pieces of 
soda of more than 15 or 
20 grains in weight, and 
that only when the dis- 
tance between the wires 


was about one-eighth or 
one-tenth of an inch. The substance produced from potash remained 
fluid at the temperature of the atmosphere at the time of its production; 
that from soda, which was fluid in the degree of heat of the alkali 
during its formation, became solid on cooling, and appeared having the 
lustre of silver (23), (24). 


Thus only a few days after the discovery of potassium Davy was able to ‘ 




Sodium and Potassium Proved to Be Elements 


277 


announce the isolation of another new metal, which he named sodium. 
However, it still remained for him to prove the elementary nature of these 
metals, which many chemists believed to be compounds of the alkali and 
hydrogen. Gay-Lussac and Thenard argued, for example, that, since 



Edgar Fahs Smith Memorial Collection, University of Pennsylvania 


A Letter by Sir Humphry Davy in Which He Introduces Mme. Lavoisier de 
Rumford to Dr. Ure op Glasgow 

#• 

ammonium = ammonia + hydrogen, potassium = potash + hydrogen. 
It was finally proved, however, that no hydrogen can be evolved from 
potassium, and that Davy was correct in regarding sodium and potassium 
as elements (8). 

Mr. A. Combes, one of Davy’s admirers, communicated some interesting 
comments on this discovery to Nicholson's Journal (27): 






278 Discovery of the Elements 

I attended his course of lectures of 1807 [said Mr. Combes] and in 
referring to my notes I find that he stated it as a fact, that all bodies 
of known composition attracted by tiie negative pole in the Voltaic 
circuit consisted principally of inflammable matter, and were natu- 
rally positive; and that it was probable therefore, that all bodies of 
unknown composition attracted by this pole, and which were naturally 
positive, might also contain inflammable matter. In his lectures in 
1801,* he stated, that, in looking for inflammable matter after those 
ideas in the fixed alkalies, he had discovered it, and that he had likewise 
found what he had not expected, that it was metallic in its nature. 
In this instance sagacious conjecture and sound analogy were followed 
up by experimental researcji, and ended in a great discovery. 



From A. H. Norway's " Highways and Byways tn Devon and Cornwall” 

St. Michael’s Mount and Bay near Penzance, Cornwall, Where Sir Humphry 

Davy Was Born 


Davy’s isolation of the alkali metals was brilliant in every sense of the 
word. It soon led to the discovery of the alkaline earth metals by a 
similar electrochemical method; and the alkali metals themselves were 
destined to become powerful tools in the search for other elements. 

Lithium f 

At the close of the eighteenth century, the great Brazilian scientist and 
statesman Jozi Bonif&cio de Andrada e Silva made a mineralogical journey 

* This date as given in Nicholson's Journal is obviously incorrect. 

t See also Chapter XVI, pp. 287-9. 




Lithium Minerals 


279 


through Scandinavia (41). In a letter to Mine Surveyor Beyer of Schnee- 
berg which was published in January, 1800, in Scherer's Journal , he de- 
scribed an infusible, laminated mineral which he called petalite, which dis- 
solved in nitric acid very slowly and without effervescence, and another 
new mineral which he called spodumene (34) . 

N.-L. Vauquelin’s analysis of spodumene, which the Abb£ Haiiy pub- 
lished in his Traite de Miniralogie in 1801, showed a loss of 9.5 per cent, 
which was never correctly interpreted 

until J. A. Arfwedson in 1818 dis- F ' . 1 

covered a new alkali metal, lithium, < ‘\*V- 

first in petalite, and soon after in . . ‘ ‘ 
spodumene and in lepidolite (35). Even ^ ^ ^ 1:: 1 ; *' 

before the discovery of lithium, Johann 
Nepomuk von Fuchs observed the red 
color which spodumene imparts to the 
flame; he afterward expressed chagrin 
because he had neglected to investi- 
gate the cause of this color (36). Vau- 
quelin detected the presence of an ^ 
alkali in a specimen of petalite ob- 
tained from the metallurgist E. T. 

Svedenstjema, but mistook it for pot- 
ash (13), (37). Wilhelm Hisinger also 
analyzed this mineral at least as early 
as January, 1818, and obtained prelimi- 
nary results similar to those of Arfwed- • ‘ 

son (38). When the Reverend Edward 

Daniel Clarke of the University ol a. Sisson, nth. 

Cambridge analyzed a specimen of it Bonif a ck)^de And ra d a e Silv.a 

in the same year, his results showed a Rra7iliatl spipnti ~t s t a ,, S m M *nH 



Brazilian scientist, statesman, and 
puzzling “loss” of 1.75 per cent, the poet. Discoverer of petalite and spo- 

reason for which became evident as “Sta,. 1 " 

soon as Arfwedson’s analysis was pub- lessly to improve the social conditions 
Hctiori (W\ (dri\ of the dispossessed Indians and en- 

ns \ )* \ )• slaved Negroes and to bring about their 

Johan August Arfwedson, the dis- gradual emancipation. 

coverer of lithium, was born at Skager- 

holms-Bruk, Skaraborgs Lan, on January 12, 1792 (1(f). He studied chem- 
istry under Berzelius, and it was in the latter’s famous Stockholm labora- 
tory that he made this great discovery at the age of twenty-five years. 
Berzelius described this chemical event in a letter to Berthollet written on 


February 9, 1818: 

The new alkali [said he] was discovered by Mr. Arfvedson, a very 
skillful young chemist Who has been working in my laboratory for a 



280 


Discovery of the Elements 


year. He found this alkali in a rock previously discovered by Mr. 
d’Andrada in the mine at Uto and named by him petalite. This rock 
consists, in round numbers, of 80% silica, 17% alumina, and 3% of 
the new alkali. To extract the latter from it one uses the ordinary 
method of heating the pulverized rock with barium carbonate and sepa- 
rating from it all the earths. . . 

This alkali [continued Berzelius] has a greater capacity for saturat- 
ing acids than the other fixed alkalies, and even surpasses magnesia. 

It is by this circumstance that it 



Engraved by W. T. Fry from an original Picture 
by J. Opie, R.A. 

Edward Daniel Clarke 
1769-1822 

English mineralogist and traveler. 
One of the founders of the Cambridge 
Philosophical Society. One of the first 
chemists to analyze the lithium mineral 
petalite. His “Travels in Various 
Countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa” 
contains intimate glimpses of many 
contemporary scientists and their labo- 
ratories. See ref. (49). 


ing it as the sulfate. 


was discovered. For the salt with 
the [new] alkali as base, obtained 
by analysis, exceeds greatly in 
weight what it ought to have 
weighed if its base had been soda or 
potash. It was very natural to 
conclude that a salt with an alkali 
base which is not precipitated at 
all by tartaric acid ought to con- 
tain soda. So did Arfvedson at 
first, but, having repeated the an- 
alysis of the petalite three times 
with exactly the same results, he 
thought he ought to examine each 
* constituent more thoroughly, and 
it is in consequence of such an ex- 
amination that he noticed that the 
alkaline substance had properties 
different from other alkalies. We 
have given this alkali the name of 
lithion [lithia] to recall that it was 
discovered in the mineral kingdom, 
whereas the two others were [dis- 
covered] in the vegetable king- 
dom (21). 

Arfwedson’s own account of his an- 
alysis of petalite is to be found in the 
Annales de Chimie et de Physique for 
1819. He found that it contained 
silica, alumina, and an alkali metal 
which he tried to determine by weigh- 


But [said he] it was still necessary to learn the base of the salt. Its 
solution could not be precipitated either by tartaric acid in excess or 
by platinum chloride. Consequently it could not be potassium. I 
mixed another portion of a solution of the same salt with a few drops 
of pure potash, but without its becoming cloudy. Therefore it con- 
tained no more magnesia : hence it must be a salt with soda for a base. 
I calculated the quantity of soda which would be necessary to fora 
it ; but it always resulted in an excess of about 5 parts in 100 of the 


Isolation of Lithium 


281 


mineral analyzed. Therefore, since it seemed probable to me that 
the different substances might not have been well washed, or that the 
analysis might not have been made with sufficient precision in other 
respects, I repeated it twice more with all the care possible, but always 
with results very little different. I obtained: Silica: 78.45, 79.85; 
Alumina: 17.20, 17.30; Sulfate: 19.50,17.75. At last, having stud- 
ied this sulfate more closely, I soon found that it contained a definite 
fixed alkali, whose nature had not previously been known (21). 

Petalite is now known to be lithium aluminum silicate, LiAl(Si 206 ) 2 - 
On April 22, 1818, Berzelius wrote to his London friend, Dr. Marcet. 
that Arfwedson had also found lithium in spodumene and lepidolite, and 
that the former contains about 8 per cent of this metal, whereas the latter 
contains about 4 per cent. In the spring of the memorable year (1824) that 
Wohler spent at Stockholm, he accompanied a distinguished groupof Swedish 
chemists, including Berzelius, Hisinger, Arfwedson, and C. Retzius, on a 
holiday excursion to Uto Island, about two miles out from shore in the Baltic 
Sea. The island interested them greatly, not only because of its rich iron 
mines, but also because of its rare minerals, including petalite and spodu- 
mene, in which Arfwedson had found the new alkali metal (9). Lepido- 
lite is also found on this island (12). 

Arfwedson also studied the most important lithium salts, and his results 
were quickly confirmed by Vauquelin (13 ) . Lithium differs from potassium 
in that it does not give a precipitate with tartaric acid, and from sodium 
in that its carbonate is only sparingly soluble. The beautiful red color 
which lithium salts impart to a flame was first observed in 1818 by C. G. 
Gmelin (14), (25). 

Arfwedson and Gmelin tried in vain to isolate lithium metal. After 
failing to reduce the oxide by heating it with iron or carbon, they tried to 
electrolyze its salts, but their voltaic pile was not sufficiently powerful 
(14). W. T. Brande succeeded in decomposing lithia with a powerful 
battery and obtained a white, combustible metal, and Davy also obtained 
a small amount of lithium in the same manner (14), (15), (31), (32), (33). 

Although these early investigators obtained only an extremely small 
quantity of the metal, Bunsen and Matthiessen succeeded in 1855 in prepar- 
ing enough of it for a thorough study of its properties (16). They accom- 
plished the reduction by heating pure lithium chloride in a small thick- 
walled porcelain crucible with a spirit lamp such as Berzelius used, while a 
current from four to six carbon-zinc elements (Bunsen cells) was passed 
through the molten mass. After a few seconds they saw a fused, silver- 
white regulus form at the cathode and build up in two or three minutes 
to the size of a pea. They carefully removed the globule with an iron 
spoon, placed it under petroleum, and repeated the operation every three 
minutes until they had reduced an ounce of lithium chloride (16). They 



282 


Discovery of the Elements 


also showed that lithium, although it was first found in the mineral king- 
dom, is widely distributed in all three of the natural realms. 

That the famous mineralogist, the Abbi Haiiy, held Arfwedson in high 
esteem is evident from his letter of June 13, 1820, in which he said to Ber- 
zelius, “Be so kind, Monsieur, as to offer to M. Arfvedson, of whom it 
suffices to say that he is your worthy pupil, the assurance of the profound 
esteem and distinguished respect which I bear him” (17). 

In the same year Arfwedson bought an iron-works (forge de feu) and a 
large estate at Hedenso in the province of Sodermanland, which caused 
Berzelius to fear lest this promising young chemist might abandon his 
scientific career (17). Perhaps his misgivings were well founded, for 
Thomas Thomson, after mentioning Arfwedson’s experiments on the 
oxides of uranium * and on the action of hydrogen on metallic sulfates, 
said, “He has likewise analyzed a considerable number of minerals with 
great care; but of late years he seems to have lost his activity. His 
analysis of chrysoberyl does not possess the accuracy of the rest; by some 
inadvertence, he has taken a compound of glucina and alumina for silica” 
(18). Arfwedson died at his Hedenso estate on October 28, 1841 (10). 


Literature Cited 

(/) Davy, Dr. John, “The Collected Works of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.," Vol. 1, 
Smith, Elder and Co., London, 1839, p. 117. Quotation from Sir H. D. 

(2) Paris, J, A., "Life of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.,” Vol. 1, Colburn and Bentley, 
London, 1831, pp. 33-4. Ode to St. Michael’s Mount iu Cornwall. 

(3) Davy, J., "The Collected Works of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.," ref. (/), Vol. 1, 
pp. 10-1. 

(4) Ibid., p. 51. 

(5) Ibid., p. 88. 

(6) Jagnaux, R., "Histoire de la Chimie," Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
68-73. 

(7) Davy, J., "The Collected Works of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.," ref. (/), Vol. 1, p. 
109. 

(8) FArber, E., "Geschichtliche Entwicklung der Chemie," Springer, Berlin, 1921, 
pp. 116-9. 

(9) W6hler, F., "Early recollections of a chemist, "Am. Chemist , 6, 131 (Oct., 1875). 

(10) Poggbndorff, J. C., "Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichte 
der exakten Wissenschaften," 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Article on Arfvedson (sic). 

(11) SOderbaum, H. G., "Jac. Berzelius Bref," Vol. 1, part 1, Almqvist and Wikseils, 
Upsala. 1912 - 1914 , pp. 63-4; "Lettre de M. Berzelius A M. Berthollet sur 
deux Mltaux nouveaux," Ann. chim. phys., (2), 7, 199-201 (1818). 

(12) S6derbaum, H. G*, "Jac. Berzelius Bref," ref. (II), Vol. 1, part 3, pp. 171-2V 

(13) Vauquelin, Nicolas-Louts, "Note sur une nouvelle esp£ce d’Alcali mineral," 
Ann. chim , phys., (2), 7, 284-8 (1818). 

* See Part VII, p, 132 and Part XVI, p. 291. 



Literature Cited 


283 


(14) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (6), Vol. 2, pp. 124-9. 

(15) Gmblin, L., “Handbuch der theoretischen Chemie,” ersten Bandes zweite Ab- 
theilung, dritte Auflage, F. Varrentrapp, Frankfurt am Main, 1826, pp. 597-8; 
W. T. Brande, “Manual of Chemistry/* John Murray, London, 1821, Vol. 2, p. 
57 ; Scherer’s Allgem. Nordische Ann. der Chemie, 8, 120 ( 1822). 

(16) Bunsen, R., “Darstellung des Lithiums/’ Ann., 94, 107-10 (1855). 

(17) SOderbaum, H. G., “Jac Berzelius Bref,” ref. (11), Vol. 3, part 2, p. 165. 

(18) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry/’ Vol. 2, Colburn and Bentley 
London, 1831, p. 229. 

(19) Gregory, J. C., “The Scientific Achievements of Sir Humphry Davy,” Oxford 
University Press, London, 1930, pp. 37-57. 

(20) Ibid., pp. iii-vii and 1-9. 

(21) Arfwedson, J. A., “Analyses de quelques mineraux de la mine d’Utben Su&de, 
dans lesquels on a trouv6 un nouvel alcali fixe,” Ann. chim. phys ., (2), 10, 82-107 
(1819); Afhandlingar i Kemi, Fysik och Mineralogie, 6 (1818); Set. News Letter, 
18, No. 493, 186 (Sept. 20, 1930). 

(22) Davy, H., “The decomposition of the fixed alkalies and alkaline earths,” Set. 
News Letter, 14, No. 390, 201-2 (Sept. 29, 1928). 

(23) Davy, H., “The Decomposition of the Fixed Alkalies and Alkaline Earths,” 
Alembic Club Reprint No. 6, Univ. of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1902, 51 pp. 

(24) Davy, H., “The Bakerian lecture, on some new phenomena of chemical changes 
produced by electricity, particularly the decomposition of the fixed alkalies, etc.,’ 
Sri. News Letter, 18, No. 493, 18G-7 (Sept. 20, 1930). 

(25) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Chemie,” Vol. 4, F. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 
1847, p. 41. 

(26) Brockman, C. J., “Fused electrolytes — an historical sketch,” J. Chem. Educ., 4, 
512-23 (April, 1927). 

(27) Combes, A., “Second letter on the subject of the new metals,” Nicholson's J., 
21, 365 (Suppl., 1808). 

(28) Davy, H., “Electro-chemical researches, on the decomposition of the earths; 
with observations on the metals obtained from the alkaline earths, and on the 
amalgam procured from ammonia,” Nicholson's J., 21, 366-83 (Suppl., 1808). 

(29) ‘"Oeuvres de Lavoisier,” Vol. 1, Imprimerie Imp£riale, Paris, 1864, pp. 119-20. 

(30) Ibid., Vol. 1. pp. 135 and 137. 

(31) Thomson, T., “History of Chemistry,” ref. (18), Vol. 2, pp. 264-5;, Annals of 
Philos., (1), 12, 16 (July, 1818). 

(32) Weeks, M. E. and M. E. Larson, “J. A. Arfwedson and his services to chemis- 
try,” J. Chem, Educ., 14, 403-7 (Sept., 1937). 

(33) Arfwedson, J. A., “Undersdkning af nAgre mineralier,” K. Vet . Acad. Handl. 
1822, pp, 87-94; Annals of Philos., 23, 343-8 (May, 1824). 

(34) de Andrada, J. B., “Kurze Angabe der Eigenschaften und Kennzeichen einiger 
neuen Fossilien aus Sehweden und Norwegen, nebst qinigen chemischen Bemer- 
kungen fiber dieselben,” Scherer's Allg. J. der Chemie, 4, 28-39 (Jan., 1800). 

(35) Funk, G., “Bidrag till Sveriges mineralogi,” Arkiv for Kemi, Mineralogi och 
Geologi, 5, 21, 221-2 (1914). 

(36) von Kobell, Franz, “Bibliography of Johann Nepomuk von Fuchs,” Am. J . 
Sci. (2), 23, 99 (1857). 

(37) Vauqurlin, Nicolas-Louis, Schw. J ., 21, 397-401 (1817). 

(38) SOderbaum, H. G.,.ref. (11), Vol. 8, pp. 50-1. Letter of Berzelius to Hisinger, 
Jan. 12, 1818. 



284 Discovery of the Elements 

(39) Gmelin, C. G., “Analysis of petalite and examination of the chemical properties 
of lithia,” Annals of Philos. , 15, 341-51 (May, 1820). 

(40) Clarke, E. D., “Description and analysis of a substance called petalite, from 
Sweden,” ibid., 11, 196-8 (March, 1818) ; ibid., 11, 365-6 (May 1818). 

(41) Neiva, VenAncio de Figueiredo, “Rezumo Biogr6fico de Jozi Bonif&cio de 
Andrada e Silva, o Patriarca da Independence do Brazil,” Irmaos Pongetti, Rio 
de Janeiro, 1938, 305 pp. 

(42) Kopp, H. ref. (25), Vol. 4, pp. 3-41. 

(43) Cullen, Edmund, “Physical and Chemical Essays Translated from the Original 
Latin of Sir Torbem Bergman,” J. Murray, Balfour, Gordon, and Dickson, Lon- 
don, 1784, Vol. 1, p. 21 ; ibid., Vol. 2, footnote to p. 438. 

(44) Bohnius, D. Joh., “ Dissertationes Chyniico-Physicae,” Thomas Fritsch, Leip- 
zig, 1696, pp. 381-2. 

(45) Bobrhaavk, H., “Elemens de Chytnie,” Chardon, fils, Paris, 1754, Vol. 1, pp. 
188, 197. 

(46) du Hamel du Monceau, H.-L., “Ueber die Basis des Seesalzes,” Crell's Neues 
chem. Archiv, 4, 166-70 (1785); Hist, de Vacad. roy. des sciences (Paris), 1736, 
p. 89. 

(47) “Recueil des m£nioires de chyrnie. . .dans les actes de l’acad. des sci. de Stokolm 
(sic). . .,” Vol. 2, pp, 515-7; G. Brandt, “Observations et experiences sur les 
differences qui se trouve entre la soude et la potasse,” Mem. de Vacad. roy. de 
Suede, Vol. 8 (1746). 

(48) Marggraf, A. S., “Chymische Schriften,” Arnold Wever, Berlin, 1768, revised 
ed., Vol. l,pp. 134-78. 

(49) Obituary of Edward Daniel Clarke. Annual Register 1822, pp. 274-6. 




XVI. J. A. ARFWEDSON AND HIS SERVICES TO CHEMISTRY* 

Although the histories of chemistry devote but little space to the work of 
J. A. A rfwedson, the discoverer of lithium , Berzelius' correspondence , 
travel-diary , and autobiography contain much interesting information about 
him. The superb biography of Berzelius which the late H. G. Soderbaum 
completed near the close of his life also throws much light on Arfwedson* s 
chemical activity. 


Johan August Arfwedson was born in January, 1792, t (I), {2)> on the 
family estate at Skagerholms-Bruk in Skaraborg County, Sweden. Until 
the age of fourteen, he was educated at home, and in 1806 he entered the 
college (hogskolan) at Upsala. After completing the mining course at 
Upsala and the mining examinations, he entered the Royal Bureau of 
Mines at Stockholm, where he served as secretary at the Bureau, and still 
found time to carry on research in chemical analysis in Berzelius’ famous 
laboratory. When the twenty -five-year-old Arfwedson entered this lab- 
oratory early in 1817, he had among his classmates Count H. G. Trolle- 
Wachtmeister, ten years his senior, and Lieutenant C. A. Arrhenius, the 
discoverer of gadolinite, who was then sixty years of age. 

Arfwedson immediately set to work analyzing meionite and leucite 
( 3 ), (4), (5). He observed that although the leucite was very infusible, 
the meionite melted readily before the blowpipe, swelled, and formed an 
enamel. Since his analysis of meionite agreed closely with Klaproth’s 
analysis of leucite, Arfwedson analyzed a specimen of leucite and found 
these two minerals to be very similar in composition, except that the leucite 
contained no lime. Suspecting, therefore, that the lime must be the cause 
of the meionite’s fusibility, he mixed a little lime with the leucite, after 
which it, too, could be easily melted. 

In the autumn of the same year, Arfwedson completed a beautiful re- 
search on the oxides of manganese. He determined the per cent of man- 
ganese in the brown powder obtained by igniting manganous oxide and in 
the black powder, manganic oxide, obtained by evaporating this brown 
manganosic oxide with nitric acid and gently igniting the residue. Since 
he found it difficult to get the black powder of constant composition, he 
recommended that in analytical work the oxide should always be strongly 
ignited and weighed as manganosic [mangano-manganic] oxide, Mn 3 0 4 . 

Arfwedson also observed that the ratio of the oxygen in manganous 
oxide to the oxygen in manganic oxide is as 1 to U/ 2 , a relation which the 
modem chemist expresses in the formulas MnO and Mn 2 0 3 . He realized 

* Presented by Mary E. Larson and the author before the Divisions of History of 
Chemistry and Chemical Education at the Midwest Regional Meeting of the A. C. S., 
Omaha, Nebraska, April 30, 1937. 

t Sdderbaum (1) and Leijonhufvud (2) give the date of Arfwedson's birth as January 
4th; the unsigned obituary (4) in the Kongl. Vet. Acad. Handl. gives it as January 12th. 

286 



286 


Discovery of the Elements 


that manganosic oxide must be a compound of these two oxides, and rea- 
soned that “if this compound, like ferrous-ferric oxide, may be supposed 
to be of such composition that the oxide contains twice as much metal and 
three times as much oxygen as the protoxide, this compound consists of 
72.82 per cent metal and 27.18 per cent oxygen ... I have called this oxide 
oxidum manganoso-manganicum because of its resemblance to ferroso-ferric 
oxide, the composition of which Herr Professor Berzelius described in his 



Courtesy Mr. Carl Bjdrkbom, Royal Library, Stockholm 
Johan August Arfwedson, 1792-1841 
This lithograph by Fehr and Muller of Stockholm was 
labeled by Berzelius "Reskamraten Arfvedson” (traveling 
companion Arfvedson) . Berzelius placed it in the manuscript 
of his travel diary "Reseanteckningar.” 

Attempt to lay the foundations of a purely scientific system for Mineralogy , 
page 92.” 

Manganosic oxide is now known to contain only 72.03 per cent of man- 
ganese. Since Arfwedson obtained 1.0735 grams of manganosic oxide by 
igniting one gram of manganous oxide, which is in good agreement with the 
value now accepted (1.0752 grams), his experimental work must have been 
excellent. In computing the per cent of manganese in manganosic oxide, 
however, he made the mistake of accepting 21.88 per cent as the oxygen 
content of manganous oxide, a value which Professor Johann Friedrich 
John of Berlin had obtained by the analysis of manganous sulfate, Arf- 




287 


Johan August Arfwedson 

wedson determined the composition of manganous oxide by passing hydro- 
gen chloride over a weighed portion of manganous carbonate, treating the 
resulting manganous chloride with an excess of silver nitrate, and weighing 
the silver chloride. Although his value of 22. 14 per cent oxygen in man- 
ganous oxide was somewhat better than that of John (the value now ac- 
cepted is 22.56 per cent), Arfwedson lacked confidence in it and stated, 
“I have reason to suspect a slight admixture of oxide in the muriate I inves- 
tigated, and therefore the result of my analysis is probably less reliable. " 
In September, 1817, Berzelius reported Arfwedson’s research in letters to 
Dr. Marcet and Gay-Lussac ( 6 ), and in the following year Arfwedson 
published it in the Afhandlingar i Fysik, 

Kemi och Miner alogi (7), the editorial 
staff of which he had recently joined. 

When he had completed the manga* 
nese research, Berzelius set him to work 
at analyzing a new mineral, petalite, from 
the iron mine on Uto, one of the many 
rocky islands or skerries which comprise 
Stockholm's superb archipelago. Arf- 
wedson fused the petalite with potas- 
sium carbonate, determined the silica in 
the usual manner, and precipitated the 
alumina with ammonium carbonate. His 
analysis totaled only 96 per cent. Sur- 
prised to find such a large loss in such a 
simple analysis, he decomposed the pet- 
alite with barium carbonate. After re- 
moving the silica and alumina and the bar- 
ium Sulfate Obtained by adding excess Sul- From Berzeli ™' “ Lehrbuch der Chemie" 
furic acid, he evaporated the washings, Berzelius’ Blowpipe Lamp 
volatilized the ammonium salts, and found 

a fused residue of a soluble, nonvolatile sulfate. Since an aqueous solution 
of this salt gave no precipitate with tartaric acid, “platina solution," or 
caustic potash, the base could be neither potash nor magnesia. Arfwedson 
therefore assumed that the salt must be sodium sulfate, but when he calcu- 
lated his results on that assumption, his analysis totaled about 105 per cent. 
Thinking that this excess weight must be due to improper washing of his 
precipitates, he repeated the analysis twice and obtained in duplicate de- 
terminations 19.500 and 17.75 per cent of the unknown sulfate. 

In a letter to Wilhelm Hisinger, who was then analyzing the same mineral, 
Berzelius wrote on January 12, 1818, . . All these facts have led us to 

believe that petalite perhaps contains a new alkali ... of such great saturat- 
ing capacity that, when the salt is computed as a sodium salt, the excess in 




288 


Discovery of the Elements 


weight arises through the fact that the salt contains much less base than a 
sodium salt. If this be true, Arfwedson has had the good fortune to make 
in his second mineralogical analysis one of the most remarkable discoveries 
which can be made in this manner . . .” ( 3 ). Berzelius also announced 
Arfwedson's discovery of lithium to Dr. Marcet and Count Berthollet in 
the same letters in which he mentioned his own discovery of selenium (8). 
Arfwedson's announcement of the discovery was published in the Afhand- 
lingar in the same year ( 9 ). According to Dr. Soderbaum (5), Berzelius 
himself deserves a great deal of credit for the discovery of lithium as well 
as selenium, but was generous enough to let the lithium research be pub- 
lished under Arfwedson’s name alone. 

Arfwedson prepared lithium acetate, ignited it, and noted the insolu- 
bility of the resulting lithium carbonate in water and its action on platinum. 
He also prepared and studied the bicarbonate, sulfate, nitrate, chloride, 
tartrate, borate, hydroxide, and a double sulfate which he reported as 
lithium alum. He mentioned that lithium hydroxide is much less soluble 
than the other caustic alkalies and that it has a greater “saturation ca- 
pacity” [lower equivalent weight] than they. Because of its ability to 
form deliquescent salts with nitric and hydrochloric acids, Arfwedson recog- 
nized the close relation between the new alkali and the alkaline earths, 
especially magnesia. 

His attempt to decompose the new base with Berzelius' galvanic battery 
of fifty pairs of plates in an electrolyte of sodium chloride was unsuccessful. 
As early as 1818, however, Sir Humphry Davy obtained a minute amount of 
lithium metal (10). When he passed a current through fused lithium 
carbonate in a platinum capsule, “the alkali decomposed with bright 
scintillations, and the reduced metal being separated, afterward burnt. 
The small particles which remained a few moments before they were re- 
converted into alkali . . . were . . . very similar to sodium. A globule of 
quicksilver made negative and brought into contact with the alkaline 
salt, soon became an amalgam of lithium, and had gained the power of 
acting on water. . .” 

Most standard works of reference also contain incomplete state- 
ments that lithium was isolated by Brande (or Brandes) and refer to 
Scher., 8, 120 or Schweigger’s J., 8, 120. The correct reference is 
Scherer's Allgemeine Nordische Annalen der Chem., 8, 120 (1822), which 
merely states that W. T. Brande used a voltaic pile to prepare lithium 
as a shining, white, combustible metal and refers to the second London 
edition of his “Manual of Chemistry,” Volume 2, page 57. This edi- 
tion was published by John Murray in 1821. Braude's complete 
statement therein is as follows : “When lithia is submitted to the action 
of the Voltaic pile, it is decomposed with the same phenomena as 
potassa and soda; a brilliant white and highly combustible metallic 
substance is separated, which may be called lithium , the term lithia 



Arfwedson and Berzelius 


289 


being applied to its oxide. The properties of this metal have not 
hitherto been investigated, in consequence of the difficulty of procuring 
any quantity of its oxide."* 

In 1821 Arfwedson published a supplementary note to his lithium re- 
search (22), in which he stated that the salt which he had previously re- 
ported as lithium acid sulfate must be the normal sulfate and that the 
double sulfate he had at first taken for lithium alum was really potassium 
alum resulting from a trace of potassium in his alumina. 

In the summer of 1818 Arfwedson went to England, taking with him 
specimens of Berzelius' new element selenium to present to Dr. Marcet, Sir 
Humphry Davy, and Dr. W. H. Wollaston as gifts from the discoverer. 
Berzelius met him there later and accompanied him on visits to Dr. Wollas- 
ton, William Prout, Sir Joseph Banks, F. C. Accum, William Allen, and the 
geologist John Farey, Senior. In company with Berzelius he studied at 
first hand the soda-water, gas, and brewing industries of England. In 
October of the same year the aged Abb€ R.-J. Haiiy of Paris entertained 
Berzelius and Arfwedson and gave them some inspiring lessons on miner- 
alogy (12). 

In June, 1819, Berzelius, Arfwedson, Alexandre and Adolphe Brongniart, 
and several other scientists made a geological tour of the Fontainebleau 
Forest and the country surrounding Clermont. Part of the journey was 
made in a crowded diligence in which “Arfwedson’s slender form became 
still more compressed." At the inn in Clermont, Arfwedson, Almroth, 
and Berzelius finally relinquished one of their two wax candles to the insist- 
ent maid servant, who needed it for another guest, and continued their 
studies by the light of Berzelius’ famous blowpipe lamp. 

The Mont-Dore region could be explored only on horseback. "I cannot 
mention," said Berzelius, “all the troubles I had (2) in getting my left foot 
up into its stirrup and (2) in throwing the right one so high up into the air 
that it arrived right over the little portmanteau which was tied back of the 
saddle . . . However, after several attempts, and after Almroth and Arfwed- 
son had laughed to their hearts’ content at my awkwardness, I finally suc- 
ceeded." 

On their journey to le Puy, their fellow passengers were good-natured, 
inquisitive peasants who thought the Swedish language was a kind of 
French patois. “Arfwedson," said Berzelius, “was 4 in their opinion, a 
prince, for he was wearing in the cabriolet the same suit he wore on the 
streets of Paris, whereas Almroth and I had adapted ourselves more to the 
dirty, careless traveling costume of the French." 

In Lyons, Arfwedson and Berzelius observed the manufacture of silk and 
velvet in the homes of the workers. In Geneva they visited Dr. and Mrs. 
Alexandre Marcet. While they were in Zurich, Professor M. A. Pictet of 
* This may serve as a correction to “The Discovery of the Elements/* 3rd ed., p. 126, 



290 


Discovery of the Elements 


Geneva announced to them that they had both been elected to honorary 
membership in the Helvetian Scientific Society. 

To simplify their journey across Prussia and homeward through Sweden, 
Arfwedson bought a fine carriage in Dresden. Berzelius and he visited the 
porcelain works at Berlin, where Berzelius bought several porcelain stop- 
cocks and was delighted to find them completely air-tight. 

After their return to Stockholm in the winter of 1819, Arfwedson set up 
his own laboratory and equipped it with apparatus he had bought during 
his travels. In the following year he purchased a handsome estate at 
Hedenso (Heden’s Island), where he equipped another chemical laboratory. 
However, since he owned the Nashulta Works and mill in Sodermanland 
near Hedenso and shares in the Gravendal Works in Kopparberg and in- 
dustrial plants at Skagerholm and Brunnsberg, his executive duties left 
him little time for research. 

On April 18, 1821, he was elected to membership in the Swedish Academy 
of Sciences. In the same year he published some analyses of cyanite from 
St. Gotthard and Ror&s and nepheline and sodalite from Vesuvius (13). 
In 1822 he published analyses of cinnamon stone, chrysoberyl, and bora- 
cite (14). He found the cinnamon stone which Berzelius had brought 
back from Vermland to be a calcium aluminum iron silicate and regarded it 
as a true garnet like the one from Ceylon which Klaproth had analyzed. 

Arfwedson’s analysis of Brazilian chrysoberyl was severely criticized by 
Thomas Thomson, who said that “by some inadvertence, he has taken a 
compound of glucina and alumina for silica ,, (15). Glucina, or beryllia, 
had been discovered by N.-L. Vauquelin nearly a quarter of a century be- 
fore (16). 

Arfwedson fused the chrysoberyl three times with caustic potash in a 
silver crucible. Since a portion of the melt corresponding to about 18 
per cent of the mineral failed to dissolve in hydrochloric acid, he reported 
this residue as silica. It is now known that beryllium hydroxide, when 
freshly precipitated, dissolves readily in hydrochloric acid, but becomes 
after a time almost completely insoluble in it (17). Therefore, it is prob- 
able that Arfwedson’s “silica ,, was really the beryllium hydroxide. He 
then precipitated the alumina by adding ammonium hydroxide to the acid 
filtrate. To satisfy himself of the purity of his alumina, he saturated the 
alkaline solution with hydrochloric acid until the precipitate dissolved, and 
added a large excess of ammonium carbonate. “Had any glucina [beryl- 
lia] or yttria existed in the matter/ * said Arfwedson, “it would have been 
dissolved by this excess of carbonate of ammonia, and would have fallen 
when the filtered liquid was boiled till the excess of ammonia was driven off ; 
but the liquid stood this test without any precipitate appearing/' Arfwed- 
son was evidently unable to detect beryllia here because he had already 
filtered it off and reported it as silica. When the American chemist Henry 



Arfwedson’s Researches on Uranium 291 

Seybert analyzed the same mineral in 1824 he found it to contain from 
15 to 16 per cent of beryllia (22). 

In 1822 Arfwedson published his paper on uranium (18). More than 
thirty years before, Klaproth had heated a paste made with uranic oxide 
and linseed oil, and obtained a brown powder with a metallic luster, which 
he regarded as metallic uranium. Although others had used carbon cru- 
cibles in their attempts to reduce uranium oxide to the metal, Arfwedson 
used hydrogen. He placed a weighed portion of ignited “uranous oxide” 
[uranosic, or uranous-uranic oxide] in a bulb blown out at the center 
of a piece of barometer tubing, drove off the moisture, and passed dry 
hydrogen over it. As soon as the air had been removed, he heated the 
bulb with an Argand spirit lamp. A vigorous reaction took place, and in 
a few minutes the green “uranous oxide” had been changed to “a powder 
of a liver-brown color,” which Arfwedson believed to be uranium metal. 

He also prepared the “potash muriate of uranium” [potassium uranyl 
chloride, KaCUOaJCU], and attempted to analyze it by reduction with 
hydrogen just as Berzelius had analyzed potassium chlorplatinate (19). 
As Arfwedson passed hydrogen over the strongly heated salt, it continued 
to lose hydrochloric acid for more than two hours. After cooling the ap- 
paratus, he washed out the potassium chloride and the undecomposed salt 
and obtained a dark, crystalline powder with a metallic luster. When this 
was heated, it became converted into green “uranous oxide” [uranosic 
oxide]. During this change, 100 parts of the so-called “metal” [uranous 
oxide] gained 3.7 parts of oxygen. This was evidently the reaction: 
3UC>2 + 0 2 = U3O8, in which 100 parts of uranous oxide actually gain 3.95 
parts of oxygen; 100 parts of true uranium metal would have gained 17.9 
parts of oxygen. Arfwedson, however, did not believe that his powder 
could be an oxide, for, according to Sir Humphry Davy’s new theory re- 
garding the composition of muriatic [hydrochloric] acid, the double chloride 
of uranium and potassium contained no oxygen. 

Although Arfwedson, Klaproth, Berzelius, and many other eminent 
chemists long regarded this crystalline powder as the metal, E. M. Peligot 
in 1841 obtained the true metal. When he heated uranous oxide with 
carbon in a current of chlorine, h,e obtained carbon monoxide, carbon di- 
oxide, and a green crystalline compound which is now known to be uranous 
chloride, UCI4. Since the evolution of carbon dioxide and carbon mon- 
oxide showed that the so-called “uranium” must contain oxygen, Peligot 
heated the uranous chloride with potassium and succeeded for the first time 
in preparing and studying true metallic uranium. As early as 1824, how- 
ever, Friedrich Stromeyer had doubted that Arfwedson’s “uranium” was 
the metal (23). 

When Arfwedson tr.ied to analyze lead uranate by reducing it with hydro- 
gen, it gained weight and became hot. When he placed the reduced mass 



292 


Discovery of the Elements 


on paper, he was astonished to see it burst into flame. He also prepared 
other pyrophoric alloys of uranium in the same way. “The uranium 
alloys," said he, “absorb oxygen again at ordinary temperatures, become 
ignited, and thus constitute a peculiar kind of pyrophors which are not 
inferior in flammability to those already known." 

In 1822 Arfwedson published a paper on the decomposition of sulfates 
with dry hydrogen (20). In the following year the British mineralogist 
H. J. Brooke (1771-1857) described a new mineral, arfwedsonite (21). 
“The benefits which mineralogy has derived from the labours of Mr. 
Arfwedson," said he, “have induced me to associate his name with this 
mineral, which is from Greenland, and is black and foliated, and has been 
hitherto called ferriferous hornblende ..." 

In the autumn of 1824 Arfwedson helped Berzelius and Wilhelm Hisinger 
arrange the mineral collection of the Academy of Sciences according to 
Berzelius’ chemical system. Two years later Berzelius visited Arfwedson 
at Hedenso. “This," said he, “is a most beautiful place, and Arfwedson 
and his wife have improved it since I was here last time. Inside there 
reigns extreme neatness and a degree of luxury which could be much less 
and still be sufficient" (3).* Berzelius’ pleasure was marred, however, by 
an attack of gout which did not yield even when Arfwedson himself ap- 
plied nine leeches to the affected knee. 

Although Arfwedson ’s business interests more and more distracted his 
attention from chemical research, this was not caused by the love of 
money. When one of his uncles bequeathed him the magnificent Forssby 
estate with its precious collection of oil paintings, Arfwedson allowed this 
inheritance to be shared according to law with the other heirs. 

In the last year of his life, the Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded 
him its large gold medal (2) in honor of his discovery of lithium. He died 
at Hedenso on October 28, 1841, and was survived by his wife and three 
sons. The Vetenskapsacademiens Handlingar for that year contained the 
following tribute to his memory: “His love of order gave an impress of 
neatness not only to his person but also to everything about him. He had 
a pleasant manner; when different points of view were exchanged, he ex- 
pressed himself with a deliberateness which was not compliance and with a 
thoroughness which showed deep thought. One may venture to say that, 
because he was obliged to devote his time to the management of a consider- 
able fortune, . . . the science to which he devoted himself in his youth lost 
much (4)." 

In conclusion we wish to thank Mr. Carl Bjorkbom of the Royal 
Library at Stockholm and Miss Amy Wastfelt of Upsala for their kind as- 
sistance. 

* Letter of Berzelius to Carl Palmstedt, July 26, 1826. 



Literature Cited 293 

Literature Cited 

( 1 ) Boethius, B., “Svenskt biografiskt lexikon," A. Bonnier, Stockholm, 1918. Arti- 
cle on Arfwedson by H. G. Soderbaum. 

( 2 ) Leijonhufvud, K. A. K:son, “Ny svensk slaktbok," P. A. Norstedt & Sdner, 
Stockholm, 1906, pp. 94-5. 

(3) Soderbaum, H. G., “Berzelius levnadsteckning," Almqvist & Wiksells Bok- 
tryckeri A.-B., Upsala, 1929-31, 3 vols. 

(4) Anon., “Biografi ofver Johan August Arfvedson, Brukspatron,” Kongl. Vet. Acad. 
Handl., 1841, pp. 249-55. 

(5) Arfwedson, J. A., “Analys af melonit dioctaedre och af leucit fr&n Vesuvius," 
Afh. i Fysik , Kemi och Mineralogi , 6, 25,5-62 (1818). 

(6) SOderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref, "Almqvist & Wiksells, Upsala,1912-1914, 
Vol. 1, part 3, pp. 158-9. Letter of Berzelius to Marcet, Sept. 23, 1817; Ann. 
chim. phys., (2), 6, 204-5 (1817). Letter of Berzelius to Gay-Lussac, Sept. 28, 
1817. 

(7) Arfwedson, J. A., “Undersokning af oxidum manganoso-manganicum, en hittills 
okand kemisk forening af manganoxidul och oxid," Afh. i Fysik, Kemi och Min., 
6, 222-36 (1818); Annals of Philos., 23, 267-75 (Apr., 1824). 

(<?) SOderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref," Almqvist & Wiksells, Upsala, 1912-14, 
Vol. 1, part 1, pp. 63-4. Letter of Berzelius to Berthollet, Feb. 9, 1818; ibid., 
Vol. 1, part 3, p. 160. Letter of Berzelius to Dr. Marcet, Feb. 6, 1818. 

(9) Arfwedson, J. A., “Undersokning af n&gre vid Uto Jernmalmsbrott fcire- 
kommande Fossilier, och af ett deri funnet eget Eldfast Alkali," Afh. i Fysik, 
Kemioch Min., 6, 145-72 (1818); “Tillagg af Berzelius," ibid., 6, 173-6 (1818). 

( 10) Anon., “Additional observations on lithium and selenium by Professor Berzelius," 
Annals of Philos ., (1), 11, 374 (May, 1818); Thomas Thomson, “History of physi- 
cal science from the commencement of the year 1817," ibid., (1), 12, 16 (July, 
1818); Anon., “An account of the new alkali lately discovered in Sweden," 
Quarterly J. of Sci. and the Arts, 5, 337-40 (1818); “Von Petalit und dem schwed- 
ischen rothen dichten Feldspath vom Dr. Clarke, Prof, der Mineralogie zu Cam- 
bridge," Gilbert’s Ann. der Physik, 59, 241-7 (1818). 

(11) Arfwedson, J. A., “Tillagg och rattelser vid afhandlingen om lithion i Kongl. 
Vet. Acad. Handl. for Ar 1818,” Kongl. Vet. Acad. Handl., 1821, pp. 156-9. 

(12) Berzelius, J. J., “Reseanteckningar," P. A. Norstedt & Soner. Stockholm, 
1903, 430 pp. 

(13) Arfwedson, J. A., “Undersokning af n&gra mineralier," Kongl. Vet. Acad. Handl., 
1821, pp. 147-55. 

(14) Arfwedson, J. A., “Undersokning af n&gre mineralier," ibid., 1822, pp. 87-94; 
Annals of Philos., 23, 343-8 (May, 1824). 

(15) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry," Colburn and Bentley, London, 1831, 
vol. 2, p. 229. 

(16) Vauquelin, N.-J., “Analyse de l’aigue marine, ou b£ril, et d£couverte d’une terre 

nouvelle dans cette pierre," Ann. chim. phys., [1], 155-77 (May (30 Flor6al), 

1798). 

(17) Haber, F. and G. van Oordt, “t)ber Berylliumverbindungen," Z. anorg. Chem., 
38, 380-1, 397 (Feb. 17, 1904). 

(18) Arfwedson, J. A., “Bidrag till en narmare kannedom om uranium," Kongl. Vet. 
Acad. Handl., 1822, pp. 404-26 ; Annals of Philos 23, 253-67 (April, 1824), 

(19) Berzelius, J. J., “Note sur la composition des oxides du platine et de For," Ann. 
chim. phys., (2), 18, 149-50 (1821). 

(20) Arfwedson, J. A., “Om svafvelsyrade metallsalters sfinderdelning med vat gas," 



294 


Discovery of the Elements 


Kongl. Vet. Acad. Handl., 1822 , pp. 427-49; Annals of Philos., 23 , 329-43 (May, 
1824). 

(21) Brooke, H. J., "A description of the crystalline form of some new minerals,” 
Annals of Philos . . 21, 381-4 (May, 1823). 

(22) Smith, E. F., '‘Chemistry in America,” D. Appleton and Co., New York and 
London, 1914 , p. 151; Henry Seybert, “Analyses of the chrysoberyls from 
Haddam and Brazil,” Trans. Am. Philos. Soc. (N. S.) t 2, 116-23 (1825). Read 
March 5, 1824. 

(23) Wallach, O., ” Brief wechsel zwischen J. Berzelius und F. Wohler,” Wilhelm 
Engelmann, Leipzig, 1901 , Vol. 1, p. 19. Letter of Wohler to Berzelius, Nov. 11, 
1824. 



XVII. THE ALKALINE EARTH METALS AND MAGNESIUM 

AND CADMIUM 


The isolation of the alkaline earth metals required the combined genius of 
Davy and Berzelius. After the latter had succeeded in decomposing lime and 
baryta by electrolyzing a mixture of the alkaline earth and mercury , Davy was 
able in 1808 to prepare the amalgams in larger quantity and, by distilling of 
the mercury , to isolate the metals , strontium f barium , calcium, and magnesium. 
In the year 1817 a number of preparations of zinc oxide sold by German 
apothecaries were confiscated by the inspectors , who found that zinc carbonate 
had been substituted for the oxide , that the carbonate became yellow upon 
heating , and that , when hydrogen sulfide was passed into an acid solution of the 
carbonate , a yellow precipitate resembling arsenious sulfide was thrown down. 
The researches of Dr. Stromeyer , Dr. Roloff, and Mr. Hermann proved , how- 
ever, that this yellow precipitate was not arsenic sulfide , but the sulfide of an 
unknown metal. Thus the good name of the manufacturing pharmacies was 
restored l, and the chemical world was enriched by the discovery of the new ele- 
ment, cadmium. 


If matter cannot be destroy'd, 

The living mind can never die; 

If e'en creative when alloy'd, 

How sure its immortality! 

Then think that intellectual light, 

Thou loved' st on earth is burning still , 

Its lustre purer and more bright, 

Obscured no more by mortal will (1). 

Calcium 

Although the ancients had many uses for lime, they knew nothing of its 
chemical nature. The De Re Rustica of Marcus Porcius Cato the Censor 
(234-149 B.C.), the De Architectura of Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (who lived 
in the reign of Augustus), and the Historia Naturalis of Pliny the Elder 
all discuss the preparation, properties, and uses of lime (44), (45), (46) 
Vitruvius noticed that lime from the kiln, although it was as bulky as the 
original limestone, had "‘lost about one third of its weight owing (he said) 
to the boiling out of the water’ ’ (47). * 

George Ernst Stahl (1660-1734) thought that in the slaking of this sub- 
stance the earthy element combined with the watery element to form 
a salt. He admitted that there are distinct earths that might be con- 
verted into metals by combining with phlogiston. Although most eigh- 
teenth-century chemists thought that lime and baryta were elements, 
Lavoisier believed them to be oxides (2), (12), “It is probable,” said 

295 



296 


Discovery of the Elements 


he, “that we know only part of the metallic substances which exist in Na- 
ture; all those, for example, that have more affinity for oxygen than 
for carbon are not capable of being reduced or brought to the metallic 
state, and they must not present themselves to our eyes except in the form 
of oxides, which we do not distinguish from the earths. It is very probable 
that baryta, which we have just classified with the earths, is one of these; 
it presents experimentally properties which closely ally it with metallic 

substances. It is possible, strictly 
speaking, that all the substances 
which we call earths may be simply 
metallic oxides irreducible by the 
methods we employ' ' (12). Caspar 
Neumann made some elaborate but 
unsuccessful attempts to obtain a 
metal from quicklime (3), but for this 
difficult reduction new methods, new 
apparatus, and the genius of a Davy 
were required. 

Sir Humphry's ardent nature could 
not rest content with his recent 
triumphs over sodium and potassium. 
With a conqueror’s enthusiasm he 
pushed ahead toward the still more 
difficult task of decomposing the al- 
kaline earths. In his first attempts 
he passed a current through the 
moist alkaline earth, which was pro- 
tected from the air by a layer of 
naphtha. There was slight decom 
position, but any metal that may 
have been formed combined immedi- 

Davy then tried to use potassium directly as a reducing agent. “I 
heated potassium,” said he, “in contact with dry, pure lime, barytes, stron- 
tites, and magnesia, in tubes of plate glass; but as I was obliged to use 
very small quantities, and as I could not raise the heat to ignition without 
fusing the glass, I obtained in this way no good results.” Although the 
potassium attacked the earth and the glass, no distinct metallic globules 
were obtained (2). 

The method he finally adopted was to mix the non-conducting, dry 
earth (lime, strontia, or baryta) with excess potash and fuse it. When he 
covered the alkaline mixture with naphtha and passed an electric current 
through it, he soon saw metallic globules rising and bursting into flame, 



From Muspratt's “Chemistry, Theoretical, 
Practical and Analytical ” 

Sir Humphry Davy 
1778-1829 

Professor of chemistry and lecturer 
at the Royal Institution, London. 
Scientist, poet, and humanitarian. 
Donor of the Davy Medal. 


ately with the iron cathode («?). 


Decomposition of the Alkaline Earths 




but when the flame died out, there remained nothing except potash and the 
alkaline earth with which he had started ( 2 ), (3). 

Although greatly disappointed over this failure, Sir Humphry soon 
thought out another plan of attack. This time he mixed lime with mercuric 
oxide and obtained a small amount of calcium amalgam. He also made 
similar alloys of the other alkaline earths with mercury, silver, tin, and 
lead, but never obtained enough of the alloy to permit the isolation of the 
alkaline earth metal. In May, 1808, however, Berzelius wrote Davy 
that he and Dr. Pontin, the 
king’s physician, had decom- 
posed lime by mixing it with 
mercury and electrolyzing the 
mixture, and that they had 
been equally successful in 
decomposing baryta and pre- 
paring barium amalgam (2), 

(IS). 

With the help of this sug- 
gestion, Davy finally worked 
out a method of obtaining 
the alkaline earth metals 
themselves. He mixed the 
moist earth with one-third 
its weight of mercuric oxide, 
and placed it on a platinum 
plate connected to the posi- 
tive pole of a powerful bat- 
tery. He then hollowed out 
a little cavity in the center 
of the mixture, and poured 
a globule of mercury into it 
in order to make possible the 
use of a heavy current from 
“a battery of five hundred.” 

A platinum wire dipping into 
the mercury was connected to 
the negative pole. By this means Sir Humphry obtained enough of the 
calcium amalgam so that he could distil off the mercury and see for the 
first time the silvery-white metal, calcium ( 2)> (3) f (7). 

In his letter of July 10, 1808, Davy acknowledged his indebtedness to 
Berzelius and Dr. Pontin. After describing his early failures he said : 

Since I have been favoured with your papers, I have, however, made 

new and more successful attempts, and by combining your ingenious 



Title Page of the “Chemical Works of Cas- 
par Neumann” ( 1683 - 1737 ) 

Apothecary and professor of chemistry at Ber- 
lin, His writings were carefully studied by 
Scheele and Davy. 


Courtesy Sir James C. Irvine 

Thomas Charles Hope 
1766-1844 

Scottish chemist and physician. Successor to Dr. Joseph Black at Edinburgh. 
The first chemist in Great Britain to teach Lavoisier’s views on combus- 
tion. Hope and Dr. Adair Crawford were the first to distinguish between baryta 
and strontia. 



Calcium and Barium 


299 


mode of operating with those that I be- 
fore employed, I have succeeded in ob- 
taining sufficient quantities of amalgams 
for distillation. At the red heat the 
quicksilver rises from the amalgams and 
the bases remain free. The metals of 
strontites, barytes, and magnesia are all 
that I have experimented upon in this 
way; but I doubt not the other earths 
will afford similar results. ... I con- 
sider this letter as addressed in common 
to you and your worthy fellow labourer, 
Dr. Pontin, to whom I must beg you to 
present my compliments” (14), 



Pure calcium cannot be prepared by the 
method of Davy and Berzelius, and a success- 
ful commercial process was not perfected 


until nearly a century later (32). 



Richard Kirwan 
1733-1812 

Irish chemist. Author of a trea- 
tise on water analysis, which is one of 
the first books on quantitative analy- 
sis, Famous for his early researches 
on strontia. 


Dr. Pontin (M.M. ap Pontin) 
1781-1858 

Physician to the King of 
Sweden. He collaborated with 
Berzelius in preparing amal- 
gams of calcium and barium by 
electrolyzing lime or baryta in 
presence of mercury. Author 
of a biography of Berzelius. 

Barium 

Early in the seventeenth century 
Vincenzo Casciarolo, a shoemaker and 
alchemist in Bologna, noticed that 
when heavy spar is mixed with a com- 
bustible substance and heated to red- 
ness, the resulting mixture, which be- 
came known as the “Bologna stone,” 
emits a phosphorescent glow. W. 
Derham in 1726 gave the following 
account of the “Bolognian phos- 
phorus” : “This stone is found in three 
Places near the City of Bologna; the 
first is called Pradalbino; the second 
is a small Brook near the Village Ron- 
caria; the third is called Monte 
Patemo, and is most noted for these 
Stones ; . . . It's known by a Glitter- 
ing. . .which surprizes the eye. It was 
first found out by . . . Vincenzo Cas- 
ciarolo, a Cobler, but ingenious, and a 
lover of Chymistry; who, trying 


300 Discovery of the Elements 

several Experiments with these Stones, by Chance happened on this Way of 
preparing them, so as to make them shine in the Dark, after they had been 
some Time exposed to the Sun. . . It’s usually no bigger than an Orange; 
and tho’ Licetus affirms, there never was any greater than that in 
Androvandus’ [Ulisse Aldrovandi’s] Museum, weighing about two Pound 
and a half; yet the Author hath had of five Pound. It’s very 
heavy, considering the Bulk, as being probably compounded of several 
mineral Substances. . . When It's well prepared, it leaves a Lustre in the 

Superficies, and is enlightened, not only 
by the Sun, but the Moon, and a 
Fire; but by these not so strongly, as 
the Sun. The Light, tho' it appear 
like a Coal, yet is not sufficient to 
read with, unless applied close to the 
Word. It will not retain the Light 
very long, at one Time, nor its Vertue 
above five or six Years. . (37). 

Derham also described in great detail 
the method of preparing the “Bolog- 
man phosphorus’ ’ from the mineral. 

A seventeenth-century item in the 
Philosophical Transactions states that 
“Though several Persons have pre- 
tended to know the Art of Preparing 
and Calcining the Bononian Stone, for 
keeping a while the Light once Im- 
bibed, yet there hath been indeed but 
One who had the true Secret of per- 
forming it. This was an Ecclesiastick, 
who is now dead, without having left 
that Skill of his to any one. . .S. [Mar- 
cello] Malpighi takes np|ice, That one 
S. Zagonius had a way of making out 
of the Bononian Stone Calcin'd, Statues 
and Pictures variously Shining in the 
Dark. But he adds (to our sorrow) that that Person lately Dy’d, without 
discovering to any Body his Method of Preparing it" (58). In his "History 
. * .of vision, light, and colours," Joseph Priestley stated that "the best 
method of preparing the Bolognian stone had been kept a secret in the 
Zagonian family, all of whom had died without revealing it" (59). 

Wilhelm Homberg observed that Balduin's phosphorus (anhydrous cal- 
cium nitrate) was similar to the Bolognian but shone with a somewhat 
feebler light. B.-B. de Fontenelle’s eulogy states that Homberg "worked at ' 



Naturalise k Library, vol. 7 

ULISSfc Aldrovandi 
(or Aldrovandus) 

1522-1605 (?) 

Italian scholar and collector, well 
versed in all branches of natural 
science. Professor of pharmacognosy 
at Bologna. Founder of a great 
botanical garden, museum, and li- 
brary* which he bequeathed to the 
state. Volume 4 of the superbly 
illustrated 1642 folio edition of his 
complete works contains an account 
of the "Bologna stone," barite (De 
lapide illvminabili) . 




The Bologna Stone 


301 


Bologna on the stone which bears the name of that city, and restored to it 
all its light, for the secret of it had almost been lost” (55). When he re- 
peated the experiment in Paris, he was unsuccessful. Homberg himself 
finally found that when he ground the materials in an iron mortar, the ex- 
periment failed, but when he used a bronze mortar and pestle, he obtained 
a luminous product (56). Some impurities serve as activators for producing 
a high degree of fluorescence, whereas others have an inhibiting effect. 
Hence in the most modem plants for the manufacture of fluorescent lamps, 
dust must be completely excluded (57) . 

Priestley mentioned that Jacopo Bartolomeo Beccari and other scientists 
of Bologna in 1711 “took a great deal of pains with the chymical analysis 
of this fossil, by which they thought they discovered in it some sulphur and 
also an alkaline salt ” (59). For some time this mineral was believed to be 
a kind of gypsum, but Cronstedt classified it as a special species. Marggraf 
showed in 1750 that it contains sulfuric acid, but he believed the base to be 
lime (18). 

In his famous investigation of pyrolusite, which was published in 1774, 
C. W. Scheele discovered a new base, baryta, which gave a white, nearly 
insoluble precipitate with sulfuric acid and with vitriols (25), (18). Al- 
though he first encountered the new alkali merely as an accidental or non- 
essential constituent of pyrolusite, he soon received from Torbem Berg- 
man a specimen of this mineral to which some peculiar crystals were at- 
tached. On February 28, 1774, Scheele wrote to J. G. Gahn, “Haven’t 
you seen, Sir, on Braunstein, especially on some of it, a few white sparry 
crystals? You undoubtedly have. One might take it for gypsum or cal- 
cite, but incorrectly. It is the new earth itself, combined with sulfuric acid. 
I’m curious to know with what kind of a name Herr Professor Bergman will 
christen this earth. He thinks that there must be rocks which contain a 
great deal of this earth” (60). A month later, Scheele sent some of these 
crystals to J. G. Gahn, who found that they had the same composition as 
massive heavy spar, or Bologna stone. 

Although baryta was at first a great rarity, Gahn’s discovery of the com- 
position of Bologna stone opened up to chemists an abundant source of it. 
In his letter of May 16, 1774, Scheele congratulated Gahn as follows: “I 
am delighted that you have discovered the presence in heavy spar of the 
earth I mentioned. It must therefore be named Schwerspatherde (earth of 
heavy spar). Scarcely had I investigated the crystals you sent me until I 
hurried to Herr Professor Bergman and received from him a piece of this 
spar, on which I immediately began to experiment” (60). 

Baryta was first distinguished from lime in 1779 by Scheele, who pre- 
pared it from heavy spar, a naturally occurring barium sulfate. He re- 
duced the sulfate to the sulfide by heating a sticky, pasty mixture of heavy 
spar, powdered charcoal, and honey. . After decomposing the barium sul- 



302 


Discovery of the Elements 


fide with hydrochloric acid, he added excess potassium carbonate to pre- 
cipitate the barium as the carbonate (25). Metallic barium was first 
prepared by Sir Humphry Davy in 1808 ( 2 ), ( 3 ), ( 4 ). 

Strontium 

In about 1787 a rare mineral, which had long been exhibited in one or 
two collections, was brought to Edinburgh in considerable quantity by a 
dealer in minerals. Although some mineralogists mistook it for fluorite, 
most of them regarded it as a kind of “aerated barytes” (witherite, or 
barium carbonate). It was found in the lead mine at Strontian, Argyle- 
shire, intermingled with the lead ore and with “calcareous and ponderous 
spars” (calcite and witherite) ( 48 ). 

In 1790 Dr. Adair Crawford (1748-1795) published a paper on “The 
medicinal properties of the inuriated barytes” (barium chloride) ( 18 ). 
“The muriated barytes exhibited in St. Thomas’s Hospital since the month 
of May, 1789,” said he, “was obtained by the decomposition of the heavy 
spar. Having procured some specimens of a mineral which is sold at 
Strontean [sic], in Scotland, under the denomination of aerated barytes, I 
was in hopes that the salt might be formed with less difficulty by immedi- 
ately dissolving that substance in the muriatic acid. It appears, however, 
from the following facts, which have been verified by the experiments of 
my assistant, Mr. Cruikshank, as well as by my own, that this mineral 
really possesses different properties from the terra ponderosa [baryta] of 
Scheele and Bergman” ( 49 ). 

Dr. Crawford showed in this paper that the salt (strontium chloride) ob- 
tained by dissolving the new mineral in hydrochloric acid differs in several 
respects from barium chloride. It is much more soluble in hot water than 
in cold, the strontium salt is much the more soluble in water and produces a 
greater cooling effect, and these two chlorides have different crystalline 
forms. He concluded therefore that “the mineral which is sold at Strontean 
[sic] for aerated terra ponderosa possesses different qualities from that 
earth, although at the same time it must be admitted that in many par- 
ticulars they have a very near resemblance to each other.” He also stated 
that “it is probable that the Scotch mineral is a new species of earth which 
has not hitherto been sufficiently examined” and that “Mr. Babington. ♦ . 
has for some time entertained a suspicion that the Scotch mineral is not the 
true aerated terra ponderosa.” In 1790 Dr. Crawford sent a specimen of 
the new mineral (strontianite, strontium carbonate) to Richard Kirwan 
for analysis ( 50 ). 

Adair Crawford was born at Antrim, Ireland, and received his degree of 
doctor of medicine at Glasgow in 1780. After settling in London he became 
a physician at St, Thomas’s Hospital, a member of the Royal College of 



Adair Crawford and Thomas Charles Hope 303 

Physicians, and professor of chemistry at Woolwich. He died in 1795 at 
the estate of the Marquis of Lansdowne, near Lymington, Hants (51). 

According to Robert Hunt, Dr. Crawford “was distinguished by his de- 
sire to be accurate in all his investigations. All his pieces of apparatus were 
graduated with delicate minuteness which has never been surpassed” (52). 
In his epitaph for Dr. Crawford, Mr. Gilbert Wakefield described him as 
follows: “In the practice of his profession intelligent, liberal, and humane; 
in his manner gentle, diffident, and unassuming; his unaffected deference 
to the wants of others, his modest estimate of himself, the infant simplicity 
of his demeanor, the pure emanation of kind affection, and a blameless heart 
rendered him universally beloved. To these virtues of the man his con- 
temporaries alone can testify. As a votary of science and author of a 
treatise on Animal Heat, posterity will repeat his praise” (51). 

Near the close of 1791, Thomas Charles Hope of Edinburgh began an 
elaborate investigation of the Strontian spar, the results of which he pre- 
sented to the College Literary Society of Edinburgh in March, 1792, and 
to the Royal Society of Edinburgh on November 4, 1793. In these experi- 
ments he made a clear distinction between witherite and strontian spar 
(strontianite) and proved conclusively that the latter contains a new earth 
“strontites,” or strontia (26), (30), (48). He noticed that strontia slakes 
even more avidly with water than does lime; that, like baryta, it is much 
more soluble in hot water than in cold ; that its solubility in water is ex- 
tremely great; and that all its compounds, especially the chloride, tinge 
the flame of a candle red. “This flame color,” said Hope, “was first men- 
tioned to me in the 1787 by an ingenious gentleman, Mr. Ash, who was 
then studying physic at Edinburgh.” Dr. Hope also noticed the green 
flame color of barium and the red of calcium, which he was able to distin- 
guish from the more brilliant red of strontium. 

Although many of the properties of strontia are intermediate between 
those of lime and baryta, he proved that it is not a combination of the two 
and that it “bears repeated solutions, crystallizations, and precipitations 
without showing the smallest disposition to a separation of principles” 
(48). Thus it is evident that Dr. Hope foreshadowed in 1793 one of the 
triads which J. W. Dobereiner pointed out in 1829. 

Benjamin Silliman the Elder studied at Edinburgh in 1805. “My 
earliest introduction,” said he, “among men of science was to Dr. Thomas 
Hope, Professor of Chemistry &c. in the University of Edinburgh. I found 
him at his house in New Town and received a very kind and courteous wel- 
come. Dr. Hope was a polished gentleman, but a little stately and formal 
withal. ... He proved himself a model professor and fully entitled to act 
as a mentor. The professorship of chemistry was, at the time of my Edin- 
burgh residence, very lucrative. The chair was so ably filled and the science 
so fully illustrated by experiments that the course drew a large audience 



304 


Discovery of the Elements 


which, at three guineas a ticket, probably gave him an income of four 
thousand dollars or more — some said, five thousand. He with his brother 
kept bachelors' hall in a handsome house on Princes Street, in the New 
Town. . . . 


“Dr. Hope’s lectures. . .were not only learned, posting up the history of 
the discovery, and giving the facts clearly and fully, but the experiments 
were prepared on a liberal scale. They were apposite and beautiful, and so 
neatly and skilfully performed that rarely was even a drop spilled upon the 



table. . . Dr. Hope lectured 
in full dress, without any 
protection for his clothes; 
he held a white handker- 
chief in his hand, and per- 
formed all his experiments 
upon a high table, himself 
standing on an elevated 
platform, and surrounded 
on all sides and behind by 
his pupils. . .” (53). 

In his “Story of the Uni- 
versity of Edinburgh,” Sir 
Alexander Grant said that 
“Hope was fully alive to 
the importance of the 
quantitative age in Chem- 
istry ... he had learnt 
Lavoisier’s views from 
himself, and in personal 
communication with Dal- 
ton had imbibed his ideas 


American chemist, geologist, mineralogist . and 
pharmacist. This miniature by Rogers was made in 
1818, the year in which Silliman founded the American 
Journal of Science (thirteen years after he had studied 
in Edinburgh under T. C. Hope). 


of atomic constitution . ’ ’ 
Professor Hope's two 
greatest contributions to 
science were his research 


on strontia and his ob- 
servation of the curious and beneficent property that water has of at- 
taining its maximum density at a certain temperature (now fixed accurately 
at 4°C.). He abandoned research, however, in order to devote all his time 
to the improvement of his lectures. Since he sometimes had more than 
five hundred students, it was necessary for him to perform the lecture ex- 
periments on a very large scale (54). 

Among the first to investigate strontia were F. G. Stilzer, J. F. Blumen- 
hach, J. G, Schmeisser (IS), Court-Apothecary J. K. F. Meyer of Stettin, 


Strontium and Magnesium 305 

R. Kirwan (28), (29), (50), M. H. Klaproth (19), Bertrand Pelletier (16), 
J . T. Lowitz, and Fourcroy and Vauquelin (17). 

Sir Humphry Davy isolated the metal in 1808 by the method he had 
used for calcium and barium (5), (3). In 1924 P. S. Danner of the Uni- 
versity of California allowed the oxides of barium and strontium to react 
with magnesium or aluminum and, 
upon distilling, obtained both bar- 
ium and strontium in a high state 
of purity. His method was a refine- 
ment of the one previously used by 
A. Guntz (33), (34). 

Magnesium 

During a drought in the summer 
of 1618 Henry Wicker (or Wickes) 
discovered on the common at Epsom, 

Surrey, a small hole filled with water. 

To his astonishment, not one of his 
thirsty cattle would drink there. 

This bitter Water was found to have 
a healing effect on external sores and 
to be useful also as an internal me- 
dicament. By the middle of the 
seventeenth century, Epsom had be- 
come a fashionable spa, attracting 
famous visitors from the continent 
(40), (62). 

In 1695 Dr. Nehemiah Grew pub- 
lished a dissertation on the medicinal 
value of salt from these wells (41). 

In 1726 John Toland wrote that 
“these aluminous waters are ex- 
perienc’d to be very beneficial. , 
the salt that is chymically made of 
’em being famous over all Europe” 

( 40 ). 

Since the supply of the natural 
salt was insufficient to meet the demand for it, it was soon superseded by 
an artificial product. According to Torbem Bergman, crystals of artificial 
Epsom salt from sea water “are sometimes so large that they are sold for 
Glauber’s salt; and on the other hand, in France, Glauber’s salt, being re- 
duced to small speculae, by agitating it during the crystallization, is sold 
for Epsom salt. “These frauds,” said he, “are indeed of little consequence, 



Johann Rudolph Glauber 
1604-1670 

German chemist who detected sodium 
sulfate (Glauber’s salt, the enixutn of 
Paracelsus) in water from a spring near 
Vienna and introduced its use into medi- 
cine. His “Description of New Philo- 
sophical Furnaces” contains methods for 
the preparation of pyroligneous acid 
and the mineral acids. 


306 Discovery of the Elements 

yet they throw a veil over the truth, and are not easily discovered” 


Caspar Neumann (1683-1737) stated that the artificial Epsom salt was 
prepared at Portsmouth by adding sulfuric acid to the mother liquors left 
in the purification of sea salt imported from Spain and Portugal (43), He 
distinguished clearly between Epsom salt and the “sal mirabile of Glauber” 
(sodium sulfate), and stated that “The earth of the bitter purging salt is 
called Magnesia alba . ... I have nowhere met with this earth in the min- 
eral kingdom. ...” He did not distinguish between magnesia alba and 
lime, however (43). 

An excellent account of the early history of magnesia is to be found in 
Bergman’s Physical and Chemical Essays (42). At the beginning of the 
eighteenth century, a certain canon regular sold at Rome a secret panacea 
called magnesia alba , or Count Palma's powder. In 1707 Michael Bernhard 
Valentini of Giessen revealed the method of preparing it by calcination 
from “the last lixivium of nitre.” Two years later, Johann Adrian Slevogt 
of Jena gave an easier way of preparing it by precipitation. Since this 
powder effervesced with acids, chemists long confused it with “calcareous 
earth,” or calcium carbonate, which they used to prepare from crabs’ eyes, 

oyster shells, and egg shells. Friedrich 



Hoffman (1660-1742) observed, how- 
ever, that when calcareous earth was 
treated with vitriolic (sulfuric) acid, it 
yielded an insipid salt, whereas mag- 
nesia was converted by similar treat- 
ment into an intensely bitter one (42). 

At this time it was believed that 
when carbonates were calcined they 
combined with an acrid principle from 
the fire to form caustic alkalies. In 
1755, however, Dr. Joseph Black (26) 
of Edinburgh published a famous treat- 
ise entitled, 4 4 Experiments upon Mag- 
nesia Alba, Quicklime, and some other 
Alkaline Substances,” in which he 
proved that carbonates lose weight 


Antoine- Alexandre Brutus Bussy 
1794-1882 

French chemist, pharmacist, and 
physician. Professor of chemistry at 
the Ecole de Phaitnacie in Paris. He 
was connected with this school for 
more than fifty years, and for nearly 
thirty years he Served as its director. 
In 1831 he obtained magnesium in 
coherent form. 


during calcination and that the sub- 
stance expelled is carbon dioxide, 
4 ‘fixed air.” In this treatise he showed 
that magnesia is entirely different from 
lime, and four years later Marggraf in 
Berlin made the same discovery in- 
dependently (6), (18), (20), (21), (38), 


Magnesium 


307 


When Sir Humphry Davy isolated a little magnesium metal in the famous 
experiments already described, he called it magnium because, as he said, 
the word magnesium is easily confused with manganese . Nevertheless, the 
name magnesium has persisted, and the metal is no longer known by the 
one which Davy gave it. 

The quantity of metal which he prepared was very small, and it was not 
until 1831 that it was first prepared in a coherent form. This was done 
by the French chemist, Antoine- Alexandre -Brutus Bussy, who was born at 
Marseilles on May 29, 1794. He studied at the ficole Polytechnique for a 
time, but his interest in chemistry soon led him to abandon his military 
career and to become apprenticed to a pharmacist. After studying phar- 



Side View of the £cole Sup£rieure de Pharmacie, Showing the Laboratories 

for Practical Pharmacy 


macy at Lyons and at Paris he became a pupil of Robiquet, who was then a 
prdparateur in chemistry at the ficole de Pharmacie. Bussy graduated in 
pharmacy in 1823 and received his medical degree in 1832. 

Although most of his researches were of a pharmaceutical nature, he pub- 
lished in 1831 a paper entitled “Sur le Radical m^taBique de la Magn&ie,'* 
in which he described a new method of isolating magnesium, which con- 
sisted in heating a mixture of magnesium chloride and potassium in a glass 
tube. When he washed out the potassium chloride, small, shining globules 
of metallic magnesium remained (8), (20), (27). 

For several years Bussy taught pharmacology in the medical school at 
the ficole de Pharmacie; and in 1856 he served as president of the Academy 





308 


Discovery of the Elements 


of Medicine. For fifty-six years he served on the editorial staff of the 
Journal de Pharmacie et de Chimie. He died at Paris on February 1, 1882, 
at the age of eighty-seven years (22). 


Cadmium 


Cadmium was discovered in 1817 by Dr. Friedrich Stromeyer, a professor 
of chemistry and pharmacy at Gottingen University. He was born on 
August 2, 1776, at a time when the phlogiston theory was drawing its last 

breath (8). After studying chem- 
istry, botany, and pharmacy in his 
native city of Gottingen, he worked 
in Paris under the great master of 
analytical chemistry, Vauquelin. 
Following the example of this 
famous teacher, he devoted himself 
almost entirely to the analysis of 
minerals (9). 

In 1802 he became a Privatdozent 
in the faculty of medicine at Got- 
tingen, and was rapidly promoted 
until in 1810 he became a full pro- 
fessor (Professor ordinarius ) . In 
the German universities, as in 
certain American ones, professors 
frequently hold government offices. 
Dr. Stromeyer was the inspector- 
general of all the apothecaries of 
Hanover. On an inspection trip 
to Hildesheim in the autumn of 



German physician, botanist, chemist, 
and pharmacist. Inspector-general of all 
the Hanoverian apothecary shops. Dis- 
coverer of the element cadmium. His col- 
lection of thirty mineral analyses is a classic 
of analytical chemistry. 


1817 he noticed that a certain 
preparation which, according to 
the Hanoverian Pharmacopoeia, 
ought to have contained zinc oxide, 


contained zinc carbonate instead. 


The events which followed were described by Dr. Stromeyer in his letter 
to Dr. Schweigger written on April 26, 1818: 


As I was last harvest inspecting the apothecaries' shops in the prin- 
cipality of Hildesheim, in consequence of the general inspection of the 
apothecaries of the kingdom having been entrusted to me by our most 
gracious Regency, I observed in several of them, instead of the- proper 
oxide of zinc, carbonate of zinc, which had been almost entirely pro- 
cured from the chemical manufactory at Salzgitter. This carbonate 
of zinc had a dazzling white colour; but when heated to redness, it as- 


Cadmium 


309 


sumed a yellow colour, inclining to orange, though no sensible portion 
of iron or lead could be detected in it. 

In an attempt to determine why this substitution had been made, Dr. 

Stromeyer visited the pharmaceutical firm at Salzgitter : 

When I afterwards visited Salzgitter, during the course of this 
journey [said he] and went to the chemical manufactory from which 
the carbonate of zinc had been procured; and when I expressed my 
surprise that carbonate of zinc should be sold instead of oxide of zinc, 
Mr. Jost, who has the charge of the pharmaceutical department of the 
manufactory, informed me that the reason was, that their carbonate of 
zinc, when exposed to a red heat, always assumed a yellow colour, 



Exhibit of Drugs and Mbdicinals at the £cole Sup£riburb de Pharmacie 
Vauquelin was the director of this school from the time of its reorganization in 1803 

until his death in 1829. 


and was on that account supposed to contain iron, though the greatest 
care had been taken beforehand to free the zinc from iron, and though 
it was impossible to detect any iron in the oxide of zinc itself. 

The fact that the zinc carbonate could not be converted into the oxide 
without discoloration interested Dr. Stromeyer greatly: 

This information [said he] induced me to examine the oxide of zinc 
more carefully, and I found, to my great surprise, that the colour which 
it assumed was owing to the presence of a peculiar metallic oxide, 
the existence of which had not hitherto been suspected. I succeeded 
by a peculiar process in freeing it from oxide of zinc, and in reducing 
it to the metallic state .... (10), 




310 


Discovery of the Elements 


His method of obtaining the metal was as follows. He dissolved the 
impure zinc oxide in sulfuric acid and passed in hydrogen sulfide. After 
filtering and washing the precipitate of mixed sulfides, he dissolved it in 
concentrated hydrochloric acid and evaporated to dryness to drive off 
excess acid. After dissolving the residue in water, he added a sufficient 
excess of ammonium carbonate solution to redissolve any zinc and copper 
that may have been precipitated. Since the carbonate of the new element 
was not soluble in excess ammonium carbonate, Dr. Stromeyer filtered it 
off, washed it, and ignited it to the oxide. After mixing the brown oxide 
with lampblack in a glass or earthen retort, he heated the mixture to 
moderate redness. Upon opening the retort he found a bluish gray metal 
with a bright luster (10). 

However, since he had only three grams of the new metal, he was un- 
able at first to make a thorough study of its properties. Fortunately, he 
soon received more of it from an unexpected source, for in the same letter 
to Dr. Schweigger he wrote : 

I am happy, therefore, to be able to inform you, that within these 
few days, through Mr. Hermann, of Schonebeck, and Dr. Roloff, of 
Magdeburg, who took an interest in this metal, I have been placed in a 
situation which will enable me to carry my experiments further. Dur- 
ing the apothecary's visitation in the state of Magdeburg some years 
ago, there was found in the possession of several apothecaries, a 
preparation of zinc from Silesia, made in Hermann’s manufactory at 
Schonebeck, which was confiscated on the supposition that it con- 
tained arsenic, because, when dissolved in acids, and mixed with sul- 
phuretted hydrogen, it let fall a yellow precipitate, which, from the 
chemical experiments made on it, was considered as orpiment. 

This fact [continued Stromeyer] could not be indifferent to Mr. 
Hermann, as it affected the credit of his manufactory, and the more 
especially as the Medicinal Counsellor Roloff, who had assisted at 
the Apothecaries’ visitation, had drawn up a statement of the whole, 
and sent it to Hufeland, who published it in the February number 
of his Medical Journal. He, therefore, subjected the suspected oxide 
of zinc to a careful examination; but he could not succeed in delect- 
ing any arsenic in it (24). 

He then requested the Medical Counsellor Roloff (23) to repeat 
his experiments on the oxide once more. This he did very readily 
and he now perceived that the precipitate which had at first been 
taken by him for orpiment, was not so in reality; but owed its exis- 
tence to the presence of another metal, having considerable resemblance 
to arsenic, but probably new. To obtain full certainty on the subject, 
both the gentlemen’ 11 had recourse to me, and have sent me, within 
these few days, both a portion of the Silesian oxide of zinc and speci- 
mens of the orpiment-like precipitate and of the metal extracted from 
it, with the request that I would subject these bodies to a new examina- 
tion, and in particular that I should endeavour to ascertain whether 
they contained any arsenic (10). 

* Dr. Roloff (31) explained that this was not done to settle a dispute, 



Isolation of Cadmium 


311 


Dr. Stromeyer soon surmised that the metal which Mr. Hermann and 
Dr. Roloff had extracted from the Silesian zinc oxide was the same as the 
one he had obtained from the Salzgitter product (31), (35), (39 ) : 

From the particulars already stated [said he] I considered it as prob- 
able that this Silesian oxide of zinc contained likewise the metal which 
I had discovered; and as it gives with sulphuretted hydrogen a pre- 
cipitate similar in colour to orpiment, I considered this to be the reason 
why the oxide was supposed to contain arsenic. Some experiments 
made upon it fully confirmed this opinion. I have, therefore, in- 
formed Mr. Hermann of the circumstance by the post; and I shall 
not fail to give the same information to Medicinal Counsellor Roloff, 
whose letter I received only the day before yesterday. 

This discovery gave great satisfaction and relief to Mr. Hermann be- 
cause it again brought his pharmaceutical establishment into good standing, 
and it also gave Dr. Stromeyer the opportunity to make a more thorough 
study of the new metal and its compounds. Because this metal is so 
frequently found associated with zinc, he named it cadmium, meaning 
cadmium fornacum or furnace calamine . In the researches which led to this 
discovery, he was assisted by two of his students, Mr. Mahner of Brunswick 
and Mr. Siemens of Hamburg. 

W. Meissner (36) of Halle and C. Karsten (25) of Berlin, without any 
knowledge of the work done by Stromeyer, Roloff, and Hermann, also 
discovered cadmium independently (11). Meissner analyzed two products 
from the Schonebeck plant sent him by Superintendent of Mines von 
Veltheim, one of which proved to be the carbonate and the other the sulfide 
of the new metal. By dissolving the carbonate in nitric acid and placing a 
rod of pure zinc in the solution, he obtained a voluminous, light gray de- 
posit. When he washed and dried it and ground the resulting powder in an 
agate mortar, it exhibited a metallic luster. Meissner made a careful 
study of the metal and its compounds. 

In 1817, perhaps as a result of his great discovery, Dr. Stromeyer received 
the honorary title of Hof rath, or court counselor. After publishing many 
papers on mineralogy and chemistry, and serving his university for many 
years as an inspiring teacher, he died on August 18, 1835, in the city where he 
was born and where he had spent most of his life (8). 

In 1821 Nils Nordenskiold wrote to Berzelius, “Stromeijer [sic] has the 
finest and neatest laboratory I have yet seen in Germany, and is certainly 
one of the few whose analyses are somewhat reliabfe. Nevertheless his 
procedures differ from yours in many important respects. I shall take the 
liberty of mentioning a few of the differences I have noticed. One sees no 
filter stand. All filtrations are made in glass cylinders such as come with 
our brandy gauges, one foot high and from 3 to 1 inch in diameter; as the 
funnels are wider, they are simply placed over the edge of the glass, the 
liquid spatters around, but the filter takes up that which spatters out. 



312 


Discovery 6f the Elements 


The filter is folded like the French ones and always extends over the rim 
of the funnel. The filter is not burned. The solutions are also precipi- 
tated in the above-mentioned glass cylinders, and the digestions are made 
in retorts or small flasks with long necks and thin bottoms. The sandbath 
is not used; the heating is done over the free flame or on hot plates. In 
regard to reagents, I have noticed that he prefers to use the fixed alkalies 
as precipitating agents instead of ammonium hydroxide, which I believe 
involves difficulty in washing the filter, especially such as they use here. 
The balance Stromeyer uses is very good, but one has to walk through a 
hall to reach the room where it is kept” ( 61 ), 

An important application of the cold light from certain compounds of 
zinc, cadmium, and other elements of Group II of the periodic system is 
the modern fluorescent lamp. A long tube, containing an inert gas at low 
pressure and a few droplets of mercury, is constructed with an electrode at 
each end. This tube has an inside coating of some stable, fluorescent sub- 
stance which will absorb the resonance line of a low pressure mercury dis- 
charge in the ultraviolet at 2,537 Angstrom units and re-radiate this en- 
ergy in a desirable part of the visible spectrum (57). The basic part of 
the fluorescent compound used always contains a lower atomic weight 
metal from Group II. Zinc silicate, for example, gives a green fluores- 
cence; cadmium silicate and the borates of cadmium and zinc give pink; 
magnesium tungstate and zinc beryllium silicate give white light; and 
calcium tungstate gives blue. 

Literature Cited 

( 1 ) Davy, Dr. J., “The Collected Works of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart./* Vol. I, 
Smith, Elder and Co., London, 1839, p. 235. Poem by Sir H. D. 

(2) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
140 - 4 . 

(3) Davy, H., “Electro-chemical researches, on the decomposition of the earths; 
with observations on the metals obtained from the alkaline earths, and on the 
amalgam procured from ammonia/' Nicholson's J., 21, 306-83 (Suppl., 1808); 
22, 54-68 (Jan., 1809). 

(4) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie/' ref. (2), Vol. 2, pp. 130-7. 

(5) Ibid., Vol. 2, pp. 138-40. 

(i 6 ) Ibid., Vol. 2, pp. 153-5. 

(7) Davy, Dr. J., “Memoirs of the Life of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.,” Longman, 
Rees, etc., London, 1836, Vol. 1, pp. 395-6. 

(8) Poggendorff, J. C., “ Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichte 
der exakten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Articles on Stromeyer and Bussy. 

(9) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” Vol. 2, Colburn and Bentley, 1831, 
pp. 217-2L 

(10) Letter from Dr. Stromeyer to Dr. Schweigger, Annals of PhU., 13, 108-11 (Feb., 
1819); translated from Schweigger's J 21, 297 (May 28, 1818); F, Strombybr, 
“New details respecting cadmium,” Annals of Phil., 14,269 (Oct., 1819); Ann . 
der Physik, 60, 193; Set. News teller, 19, 75-6 (Jan! 31, 1931). 



Literature Cited 313 

(11) Budgbn, "Cadmium: Its Metallurgy, Properties, and Uses," Chas. Griffin and 
Co., London, 1924, p. xiii. 

(12) Oeuvres de Lavoisier, Vol. 1, Imprimerie Imp6riale, Paris. 1864, p. 122. 

(13) Brockman, C. J., "Fused electrolytes — an historical sketch,” J. Chem. Educ., 
4, 512-23 (Apr., 1927). 

{14) SOderbaum, H. G., "Jac. Berzelius Bref,” Vol. 1, part 2, Almqvist and Wiksells, 
Upsala, 1912-1914, pp. 7-8. 

(15) Scheele, C. W., "Sammtliche physische und chemische Werke,” Vol. 2, 2nd 
edition translated by Hermbstadt, Rottmann, Berlin, 1793, pp. 179-82. 

(16) Pelletier, B., "Extrait d ’Observations sur la Strontiane,”^4«n. chim. phys . (1), 21, 
113-43 (Feb. 28, 1797). 

(17) Fourcroy, A.-F. and N.-L. Vauquelin, "Extrait de deux M£moires sur un 
nouveau moyen d’obtenir la Baryte pure, et sur les propri6tes de cette terre 
comparees A celles de la Strontiane,”vl»w. chirn. phys ., (1), 21, 276-83 (Mar., 1797). 

(18) Kopp, H., "Geschichte der Chemie,” Vol. 4, F. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 
1847, pp. 42-55; J. G. Schmbisser, "Account of a mineral substance called 
strontionite (sic),” Phil. Trans., 84, 419 (1794). 

(19) Klaproth, M. H., "Analytical Essays toward Promoting the Chemical Knowledge 
of Mineral Substances,” Cadell and Davies, London, 1801, pp. 223-37 and 387-98 

(20) Wootton, A. C., "Chronicles of Pharmacy,” Vol. 1, Macmillan and Co., London, 
1910, pp. 354-8 

(21) Bugge, G., "Das Buch der grossen Chemiker,” Vol. 1, Verlag Chemie, Berlin, 
1930, pp. 240-52. Biographical sketch of Black by Max Speter. 

(22) Bourquelot, "Le Centenaire du Journal de Pharmacie et de Chimie, 1809-1909,” 
Octave Doin et Fils, Paris, 1910, pp. 53-4. 

(23) Roloff, C. H., Gilh. Ann., 61, 205 (1819) ; 70, 194 (1822). 

(24) Hermann, K. S. L. t "Ueber das schlesische Zinkoxyd und fiber ein darin ge- 
fundenes sehr wahrschcinlich noch unbekanntes Metali,” ibid., 59, 95-6 (1818); 
ibid., 59, 113-16(1818). Stromeyer’s letter of Apr. 19, 1818, on cadmium, ibid., 
66, 276 (1820). 

(25) Karsten, C., Archiv Berg. Hiitt ., i, p. 209; "Aus einem Schreiben des Prof. [J. F. 
W.] Brandes in Breslau an den Prof. Gilbert,” Gilbert's Ann. der Physik, 59, 104-7 
( 1818). Letter of May 13, 1818 regarding Karsten’s work on cadmium. 

(26) Irvine, Sir J., "Scotland’s contribution to chemistry,” J. Chem. Educ., 7, 
2810-4 (Dec., 1930). 

(27) Bussy, A.-A.-B., "M4moire sur le radical ni6tallique de la magn£sie,” Ann. chim. 
phys., (2), 46, 434-6 (1831). 

(28) Smith, E. F., "Forgotten chemists,” J. Chem. Educ., 3, 35 (Jan., 1926). 

(29) Brockman, C. J., "Richard Kirwan— chemist, 1733-1812,” ibid., 4, 1275-82 
(Oct., 1927); Reilly and O’Flynn, "Richard Kirwan, an Irish chemist of the 
eighteenth century,” Isis, 13 (2), 298-319 (Feb., 1930). 

(30) Dains, F. B., "John Griscom and his impressions of foreign chemists in 1818- 
19,” J. Chem. Educ., 8, 1307-8 (July, 1931). 

(31) Roloff, J. C. H., "Zur Geschichte des Kadmiums von dem Medicinalrath und 
Kreisphysikus Dr. Roloff in Magdeburg,” Gilbert's Ann. d. Physik, 61, 205-10 
(1819). 

(32) Brace, "Notes on the metallurgy of calcium,” Chem. Met. Eng., 25, 105-9 
(July 20, 1921), 

(33) Guntz, A., "Sur la preparation du baryum,” Compt. rend., 133, 872-4 (Nov. 25, 
1901); "Sur le strontium m£tallique et son hydrure,” ibid., 133, 1209-lt) (Dec. 
23, 1901). 



314 Discovery of the Elements 

(34) Danner, P. S. f ‘‘The preparation of very pure barium and strontium,'’ J. Am. 
Chem. Soc., 46, 2382-5 (Nov., 1924). 

(35) “Aus einem Schreiben des Herrn Ober.-Berg.-Hauptmann Gerhardt an den Prof. 
Gilbert,” Gilbert's Ann. der Physik, 59, 97-9 (1818). Letter of May 1, 1818. 

(56) “Ueber ein neues Metall in dem schlesisehen Zinkoxyde, vom Dr. W. Meissner, 
Besitzer der Ldwenapotheke in Halle,” ibid., 59, 99-104 ( 1818). Letter of May 4, 
1818. 

(37) Derham, W., ‘‘Philosophical experiments and observations of the late eminent 
Dr. Robert Hooke, F.R.S. . . . and other eminent Virtuoso's in his time,” W. and 
J. Innys, London, 1726, pp. 174-83. 

(38) Speter, Max, “Joseph Black,” Chem.-Ztg., 52, 913 (Nov., 1928). 

(39) “Sur un nouveau m£tal (le cadmium),” Ann. chim. phys. (2), 8, 100-1 (1818). 

(40) Home, Gordon, “Epsom. Its History and Its Surroundings,” The Homeland 
Assoc., Epsom and London, 1901, pp. 43-63. 

(41) Grew, Nehemiah, “Tractatus de Salis Cathartici Amari in Aquis Ebeshamensi- 
bus. . .Natura et Usu,” London, 1695. 

(42) Cullen, Edmund, “Physical and Chemical Essays Translated from the Original 
Latin of Sir Torbern Bergman,” J. Murray, Balfour, Gordon, and Dickson, Lon- 
don, 1784, Vol. 1, pp. 423-40, 460-3. 

(43) Lewis, Wm., “The Chemical Works of Caspar Neumann, M.I).,” W. Johnston, 
G. Keith, A. Linde, etc., London, 1759, 586 pp. 

(44) Bailey, K. C., “The Elder Pliny’s Chapters on Chemical Subjects,” Edward 

Arnold, London, 1932, Vol. 2, p. 139; Pliny the Elder, “Historia Naturalis,” 
Book 36, chaps. 23-4. ^ 

(45) Blank, E. W., “Lime and lime kilns,” J. Chem. Educ., 17, 505-8 (Nov., 1940). 

(46) Brehaut, E., “Cato the Censor on Farming,” Columbia University Press, 1933, 
pp. 33 5, 64-6. 

(47) Morgan, M. H., “Vitruvius. The Ten Books on Architecture,” Harvard Uni- 
versity Press, Cambridge, 1914, pp. 45-6. 

(48) Hope, T. C., “Account of a mineral from Strontian and of a peculiar species of 
earth which it contains,” Trans. Roy. Soc. (Edinburgh) , 4 (2), 3-39 (1798). Read 
Nov. 4, 1793. 

(49) Crawford, Adair, “On the medicinal properties of the muriated barytes.” 
Medical Communications (London). 2, 301-59 (1790). Read Nov. 10, 1789. 

(50) Kirwan, R., “Versuch iiber eine neuer Erde, die in der Nahe von Stronthian in 
Schottland gefunden ist,” CrelVs Ann., 24, 119-25 (1795). 

(51) Munk, Wm., “The Roll of the Royal College of Physicians of London,” published 
by the College, London, 1878, Vol. 2, pp. 339-40. 

(52) Stephen, L. and S. Lee, “Dictionary of National Biography,” Oxford University 
Press, London, 1921-2, Vol. 5, pp. 49-50. Article on Adair Crawford by Robert 
Hunt. 

(53) Fisher, G. P., “Life of Benjamin Silliman,” Charles Scribner and Co., New York, 
1866, Vol. 1, pp. 159-69. 

(54) Grant, Sir A., “The Story of the University of Edinburgh,” Longmans, Green 
and Co., London, 1884, Vol, 2, pp. 397-8. 

(55) “Eloge de M. Guillaume Homberg,” Hist, de 1’Acad. Roy. des Sciences (Paris), 
1715, pp. 82 ff. 

(66) Bbrnardi, A., “La storia del fosforo di Bologna nel XVII e XVIII secolo," La 
Chimica neU' Industria , nelV Agricoltura , nella Biologic, 16, 69-74 (Feb., 1940). 

(57) Harden, J. W., “Chemicals in fluorescent lamps,” Chem. Met. Eng., 48, 80-4 
(Aug., 1941); Editorial, “Operations begin at Fairmont Fluorescent Lamp 
Plant," ibid., 48, 82-4 (Aug., 1941). 



Literature Cited 


315 


(i>8) "The Philosophical Transactions and Collections to the End of the Year 1700 
abridg’d. . John Lowthorp," Bennet, Knaplock, and Wilkin, London, 1705 , Vol. 
3, p. 346; Phil. Trans., 1 , n. 21, p. 375 (1665); ibid., 12 , n. 134, p. 842. 

(59) Priestley, J., "The History and Present State of Discoveries Relating to Vision, 
Light, and Colours," J. Johnson, London, 1772, Vol. 1, pp. 361-6. 

(60) Nordenskiold, A. PI, "C. W. Scheele, Nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeich- 
nungen," P. A. Norstedt and Sons, Stockholm, 1892, pp. 115, 118, 121, 243-4, 253. 

(61) SOderbaum, H. G., ref. (14), Vol. 11, p. 40. Letter of Nils Nordenskiold to Ber- 
zelius, Aug. 3, 1821. 

(62) Neave, E. W. J., "The Epsom spring," Isis, 34, 210-11 (Winter, 1943). 



XVIII. SOME ELEMENTS ISOLATED WITH THE AID OF 
POTASSIUM AND SODIUM: ZIRCONIUM, TITANIUM, 
CERIUM, AND THORIUM 

The earths of the titanium group had a cosmopolitan origin. The German 
chemist Klaproth discovered zirconia in 1789 while analyzing a zircon from 
Ceylon. Two years later the English clergyman William Gregor found ti- 
tania , or “ menachanile in a black sand from his own parish in Cornwall 
but announced his discovery in such a modest manner that it made little im- 
pression on the scientific world. Klaproth rediscovered this earth four years 
later in a Hungarian red schorl , and named it “ Titanerdef or titania. 
Hisinger and Berzelius discovered ceria in 1803 while investigating the Swedish 
mineral “ heavy stone of Basinas," now known as cerite. Berzelius found 
thoria, the last of these earths , in 1829 in a specimen of thorite that had been 
sent to him from an island off the coast of Norway. The difficult isolation of 
the metals titanium , cerium , zirconium } and thorium was accomplished by 
various methods involving the powerful reducing action of sodium and potas- 
sium . 


Es hat wohl nie eine Wissenschaft, in einem kleinern 
Zeitraume , raschere Fortschritte gemacht, als die chemische 
Naturkenntniss (I)*. 

Zirconium 

Zirconium minerals are widely distributed in Nature, and have been used 
for centuries. In his enraptured description of the four-square city, Saint 
John the Divine mentioned the jacinth (or hyacinth) as one of the twelve 
precious stones that garnished the foundations of the city wall (14). 

Although zircon was frequently used by the ancients for intagli, and 
although hyacinth and jargon were well known in the Middle Ages, the 
presence in these minerals of an unknown metal was not suspected until 
near the end of the eighteenth century. The earth zirconia was overlooked 
because of its great similarity to alumina, and it took the analytical skill 
of a Klaproth to detect it. In 1789 he analyzed a specimen of zircon from 
Ceylon, and realized that it contained a large quantity of a new earth, 
which he named Zirconerde, or, as one says in English, zirconia (9), (31), 
(32). All analyses of zirconium minerals made before the discovery of this 
earth were incorrect. The celebrated Torbern Bergman had, for example, 
reported the following composition for a certain hyacinth from Ceylon: 

Silica Alumina Iron Oxide Lime 

25 % 40 % 13 % 20 % 

When Klaproth analyzed the same specimen he found: 

* “No science has ever made more rapid progress in a shorter time than chemistry,’’ 

316 



Isolation of Zirconium 


317 


Silica Iron Oxide Zirconia ( Jargonia ) 

25% 0.5% 70% 

His results were soon confirmed by Guyton Morveau* and by Vauquelin (9), 
(33) , (34), (35). This mineral is now known to be zirconium silicate, ZrSiCb. 

In 1808 Sir Humphry Davy tried iii vain to decompose zirconia with the 
electric current, but Berzelius (36) finally obtained the metal in 1824 by 
heating a dry mixture of potassium and potassium zirconium fluoride in a 
very small closed iron tube placed inside a platinum crucible. After the 
quiet reaction had taken place, he cooled the tube and placed it in distilled 
water, whereupon, to use his own 
words, “There feU from the tube a 
black powder as fast as the salt dis- 
solved, and at the same time there 
was evolved a small quantity of hy- 
drogen. . . . The zirconium obtained 
in this manner is easily deposited. 

It can be washed with water without 
oxidizing. Washed and dried, it forms 
a black powder resembling charcoal, 
which cannot be compressed nor 
polished like a metal” (15). 

Although Berzelius’ method 
yielded impure zirconium, highly 
contaminated with zirconia, he had 
chosen his materials with great 
scientific acumen (37). Through 
the attempts of many research 
workers, including Ludwig Weiss 
and Eugen Naumann (38), Wede- 
kind (39), and Moissan (40), zirco- 
nium of higher and higher purity has 
been obtained. Finally in 1914 D. Lely, Jr., and L. Hamburger (41) of the 
research staff of the Philips Metal-Incandescent Lamp Works in Eindhoven, 
Holland, obtained the metal 100% pure. Their method consisted in heating a 
mixture of the tetrachloride and sodium in a bomb, using the electric current 
as the source of heat. The metal consisted of laminae which could be pressed 
into rods, drawn into wire, or burnished to a bright, mirror-like surface. 

The element is still best known, however, in the form of its oxide. Zir- 
conia linings for metallurgical furnaces are very permanent, and, because 
of their low heat conductivity, may be made very thin. Zirconia refrac- 
tories, such as crucibles, are very resistant to the action of heat, slags, and 

* During the Revolution, the scientific papers of Morveau were signed "Cit[oyen] 
Guyton/* 



Guyton-Morveau 

1737-1816 


French attorney and chemist. Pro- 
fessor of chemistry at the 6cole Poly- 
technique from 1794 to 1815. With 
Lavoisier, Fourcroy, and Berthollet he 
brought chemical nomenclature into 
accord with modem views on combus- 
tion. He made the first serious re- 
searches on the structure of steel. 


318 


Discovery of the Elements 


most acids, and may safely 
be plunged into water while 
red-hot (42). 

Titanium 

Joseph Priestley was not 
the only English clergyman 
to discover a new element. 
The Reverend William Gregor 
met with similar good fortune. 
He was born in 1761 in Corn- 
wall, and was educated for the 
ministry at Bristol and Cam- 
bridge, where he made an ex- 
cellent scholastic record, es- 
pecially in mathematics and 
the classics. He held pastor- 
ates at Deptford ' near Tot- 
ness, at Bratton Clovellv in 
Devonshire, and finally at 
Creed near Grampound, 
Cornwall (2). 

He became intensely inter- 
ested in the minerals of Eng- 
land, and acquired such 
great skill in analyzing them 
that Berzelius and other com- 
petent judges referred to him 

Introduction to the Reverend William as a famous mineralogist” 
Gregor’s Original Paper on Titanium, or (3), He was a founder and 
“Mbnachanite.” CreWs A nnalen, 1791 t 

honorary member of the 

Royal Geological Society of Cornwall, and his analyses of such substances as 
bismuth carbonate, topaz, wavellite, uranium mica (Uranglimmer) (16), 
and native lead arsenate (17) were of high excellence (4). 

The most interesting mineral that Mr. Gregor ever analyzed, however, 
was a black, magnetic sand from the Menachan valley in his own parish. 
His account of this analysis, as it appeared in Crell's Avnalen in 1791, was 
introduced by the following editorial note: 

Mr. Gregor did me the special favor of sending the manuscript of 
this paper for insertion in the Annalen , the translation of which from 
the English by my eldest son Carl, I have the honor to present to Ger- 
man analytical chemists. 

The paper begins with a minute description of the sand : 




IV. 


itotaltititgttt tmt> SJerfucfje ri6<r b<n 
SRenofamtt, fintn in CerwwiH 
n« m«9B*«|itKn ®onb; com .^rtt 

fl&Hiam <&vtw *). 

€5«nb wirt in grofjtt fRtngt 
te *in«m $twlt bt< 

VI<mCm in in 8oci<wa0 gtf unb<n. 

*tu b»(Tcn {>aupt« 

fbtlan Qmbiln ifc »ct 

.<■ ®8w*r|, tub fort tern Vtuittn na<b, 

Wit btm g&itftpmxt. Seine 
■mKM&t-'m Mtf*trt«tet 9rifie, fc>ben abet 
' ft i» mu ti mm dnbttn 

ttmifebt, btfen Sbrnct 
jtyb* ' fpniftfcb* ®<b«wrt bt< ( 
*M*fctw«i»btrt> bat* rin eitbatMiniaWn, febware 
wrti jwi Kctbebt M (ft* bt 

n bcfriKttoi = 4,4*7: *. 

'wmm* . 



iKii 


fnifkm 
■ ; ©w» ■ 

tcfilCfcit, wit - 
■> : jw.fufriklw» it bit Swale* 
- *" "% s ub «tt tew 






Titanium 


319 


This sand [said Mr. Gregor] is found in large quantity in a valley 
of the Menachan parish in the county of Cornwall. Through this 
valley there flows a stream whose principal source is in the valleys of 
Gonhilly. The sand is black, and in external appearance resembles 
gunpowder. Its grains are of various sizes, but have no definite shape. 

It is mixed with another dirty-white sand, the grains of which are much 
finer 

Gregor found that the black portion of this sand had the following 
composition : 

Magnetite Silica Reddish Brown Calx Loss 

46Vi.% 37*% 45% 4«/i.% 

The “reddish brown calx” dissolved in sulfuric acid to give a yellow 
solution which became purple when 
reduced with zinc, tin, or iron, and 
when the pulverized mineral was fused 
with powdered charcoal, a purple slag 
was formed. 

Mr. Gregor modestly stated that 
his paper was not a complete inves- 
tigation, but merely a record of dis- 
connected facts, the interpretation of 
which he would leave to more skilful 
workers and keener philosophers than 
himself. His friend, John Hawkins, 
to whom he showed the black sand, 
agreed that it must be a new mineral. 

The opinion of a man so dis- 
tinguished in mineralogy [said 
Mr. Gregor], together with the 
extraordinary properties of the 
sand, led me to believe that it 
must contain a new metallic sub- 
stance. In order to distinguish 
it from others, I have ventured to 
give it a name derived from the region where it was found — namely, the 
Menachan parish — and therefore the metal might be called menachanite. 

He cautiously added that perhaps the researches of other chemists might 
some day explain the unusual properties of the mineral and “rob it of its 
novelty.” His many duties unfortunately prevented him from continuing 
the investigation (5) of this black magnetic sand now known as ilmenite, 
FeTiOa. Strangely enough, his announcement did not attract much atten- 
tion, and thus titanium, like tellurium, was quickly forgotten. 

William Gregor died at Creed in the summer of 1817, after prolonged 
suffering with tuberculosis (47). Thomas Thomson once said of him: 



The Edgar Fahs Smith Memorial Collec- 
tion, University of Pennsylvania 

D. Lorentz von Crell 
1744-1816 

Editor of Chetnische Annalen fur die 
Freunde der Naturlehre, Arzneigelahrlheil, 
Haushaltungskunst und Manufakturen 
and of Crell ’s Neues Chemisettes Archiv. 
Professor of chemistry and counselor of 
mines at Helmstadt. 


320 


Discovery of the Elements 


Mr. Gregor of Cornwall was an accurate man, and attended only to 
analytical chemistry; his analyses were not numerous, but they were 
in general excellent. Unfortunately the science was deprived of his 
services by a premature death ( 6 ). 


Mr. Gregor’s intimate friend, the Reverend J. Trist of Veryan, mentioned 



the exemplary manner in which he had 
fulfilled all the duties of his Christian pastor- 
ate, ''dispensing to his neighbors both spiri- 
tual and temporal benefits, and enlivening 
the society of his friends by his cheerful 
and instructive conversation” (2). 

The reader will recall how the honored 
chemist, Martin Heinrich Klaproth, resur- 
rected tellurium, giving full credit to the 
original discoverer, Muller von Reichenstein. 
After Mr. Gregor’s discovery had likewise 
fallen into oblivion, Klaproth again came to 
the rescue. In 1795 he separated what 
seemed to be a new oxide from a specimen 
of red schorl, or rutile, found in Boinik, 
Hungary, and presented to him by Count 
Wiirben of Vienna (7), (£). However, since 
this oxide bore such a close resemblance to 
the one previously described by Mr. Gregor, 


Martin Heinrtch Klaproth 
1743-1817 

German analytical chemist. 
First professor of chemistry at 
the University of Berlin. In 
1810 he published, with F. Wolff, 
a chemical dictionary containing 
references to the researches cited 
therein. Klaproth’s six-volume 
“Rcitrdge zur chemischen Kennt - 
niss der Miner alkor per” is a 
collection of his remarkable 
mineral analyses. He rediscov- 
ered Gregor's “menachanite ” 
made a thorough study of its 
properties, and rechristened it 
titanium . 


Klaproth analyzed a specimen of menacha- 
nite, or "iron-shot titanite from Cornwall,” 
as he preferred to call it, for comparison {21 ) : 

Within a few years [said he] a fossil 
has been brought into notice by the 
name of Menachanite , which has been 
found in the parish of Menachan, in 
Cornwall , and consists of grey-black, 
sand-like grains, obeying the magnet. 
Mr. M’Gregor, of Menachan, who dedi- 
cates his study to mineralogical chemis- 
try, has given not only the first informa- 
tion of this fossil, but also a full narra- 
tive of his chemical researches concern- 


ing it. The chief result of these is, that menachanite has for its con- 
stituent parts irpn, and a peculiar metallic oxyd of an unknown nature . 
By the following examination it will appear that this substance, which, 
besides iron, forms the second chief component principle of menacha- 
nite, is precisely the very same which constitutes the Hungarian red 
schorl; namely, oxyd of titanium . With this opinion also, most of the 
phenomena noted down by M’Gregor, in his operations with mena- 
chanite, agree. 


Isolation op Titanium 321 

Klaproth gave the following curious reason for preferring to call the new 
element titanium: 

Whenever [said he] no name can be found for a new fossil which 
indicates its peculiar and characteristic properties (in which situation 
I find myself at present), I think it best to choose such a denomina- 
tion as means nothing of itself, and thus can give no rise to any errone- 
ous ideas. In consequence of this, as I did in the case of uranium, 

I shall borrow the name for this metallic substance from mythology, 
and in particular from the Titans, the first sons of the earth. I there- 
fore call this new metallic genus Titanium (£), (9). 

Klaproth, Vauquelin, Heinrich 
Rose (22) y and others tried in vain to 
isolate the metal. In 1822 Dr. Wol- 
laston thought he had found it in the 
form of minute cubic crystals in the 
slag of the iron works at Merthyr 
Tydvil, but Wohler (18) showed in 
1849 that these were not the metal 
itself but a mixture o* the nitride and 
cyanide. In 1825 Berzelius (20) pre- 
pared some very impure amorphous 
titanium by reducing potassium fluo- 
titanate, K 2 TiF 6 , with potassium. 

Although the resulting black powder 
gave a metallic streak, it was insol- 
uble in hydrofluoric acid and there- 
fore could not have contained much 
titanium metal (23). 

In 1849 Wdhler and Deville at- 
tempted to prepare pure titanium by 
Berzelius' method, but used a closed 
crucible in order to exclude air. 

When they found that the product 
thus obtained still contained titanium 
nitride, they heated boats containing 
potassium and potassium fluotitanate in an atmosphere of hydrogen and 
obtained a gray powder which showed a metallic luster when examined 
with a microscope (7), ( 10 ), ( 18 ). Wohler and Deville thought they had 
the metal, but, in the opinion of W. M. Thornton, Jr. ( 23 ), they were still 
dealing with the nitride. 

In 1887 Lars Fredrik Nilson and Otto Pettersson finally prepared the 
metal 95 per cent pure by reducing the tetrachloride with sodium in an air- 
tight steel cylinder ( 24 ), ( 48 ). The titanium that Moissan obtained from 



Sven Otto Pettersson 
1848-1941 


Professor of chemistry at the Uni- 
versity of Stockholm from 1881-1908 
He collaborated with Lars Fredrik 
Nilson in researches on metallic ti- 
tanium and the physical constants of 
titanium and germanium. He was 
one of the first chemists to support 
Arrhenius in his views on electrolytic 
dissociation. 


322 


Discovery of the Elements 


a 



his electric furnace was free from nitrogen 
and silicon and contained only 2 per cent of 
carbon (25). 

In 1910 M. A. Hunter (26) obtained the 
. ^ ^ metal 99.9 per cent pure by a modification of 

| Nilson and Pettersson’s method in which pure 

LJ titanic chloride and sodium were heated in a 

LL L 1000-cc. machine steel bomb capable of bearing 

40,000 kilograms of pressure. The lid, which 
rested on an intervening gasket of soft copper, 
was securely held in place by six braces. 
After the temperature had been raised to 
low redness, the reaction took place quickly 
and violently. The sodium chloride was then leached out with water, 
leaving the pure titanium. 

The oxide titania, TiOs, because of its high refractive index, is used in 
high-grade white pigments of great opacity and covering power. The 
metal unites with iron to form the useful alloy, ferro-titanium, which 
is added to molten steel to prevent formation of air bubbles, which 
would form holes in the finished castings. Thus the element that lay 
hidden for centuries in the sand of Mr. Gregor’s parish is now of direct 
benefit to mankind. 


Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Eng • 
Sci . Series , No. 1, p. 6 (1911) 

M. A. Hunter’s Bomb for 
Preparing Metallic Ti- 
tanium 


Cerium 

Wilhelm Hising, or Hisinger as he was called after being raised to the 
nobility, belonged to a wealthy Swedish family that owned the famous 
Riddarhyttan* property in Vestmanland and the Bastnas mine, in which 

the mineral cerite was 
discovered. He was 
born in December, 
1 766, and soon learned 
to love the beautiful 
minerals of Sweden. 
When only fifteen 
years old he sent 
some cerite to the fa- 
mous Scheele for anal- 
ysis, and the reply 
showed that even the 
greatest of men some- 
Statub of Carl Wilhelm Scheele at Koping, Sweden times make mistakes. 

* The reader will recall that Riddarhyttan was also the birthplace of Georg Brandt, 
the discoverer of cobalt. 





Cerite 


323 


Scheele reported that he was unable to discover any new metal in the cerite 
However, as Baron Nordenskiold said, this mistake is very excusable, for 
the mineral is difficult to handle even with modern methods of analysis (11). 
Berzelius described cerite as follows : 


In the iron mine at Bastnas, now abandoned, in the vicinity of Vest- 
manland, one finds a mineral of exceedingly high specific gravity, 
called “heavy stone of Bastnas”; that is why Scheele searched there, 
but in vain, for tungsten. This mineral remained in oblivion until 
1803, when it was simultaneously examined by Klaproth (44), by Hi- 
singer and by myself (29). We found in it a new substance; Klaproth 


called it terre ochroite. Hisinger 
and I called it cerous oxide, be- 
cause there is a higher oxide, and 
the two oxides give salts of differ- 
ent colors and properties. The 
root of the name cerium was de- 
duced from that of Ceres, f 
which Klaproth changed to cer- 
erium, but this name was soon 
abandoned. The mineral is com- 
posed mainly of cerous silicate, 
and for this reason receives the 
name of cerite. Cerium was 
afterward discovered in minerals 
from other localities; for example, 
in gadolinite, orthite, allanite, 
yttrocerite, cerous fluoride, etc.” 
( 12 ). 

The main object of Berzelius and 
Hisinger’s analysis of cerite was to 
search for yttria, which might easily 
have escaped the attention of Scheele 
and d’Elhuyar since it was unknown 
at the time their investigation was 
made (29). Although they failed to 
find yttria, Berzelius and Hisinger 



Axel Frbdrik Cronstedt* 


1722-1765 

Swedish chemist and mineralogist. 
Discoverer of nickel. Author of a 
“System of Mineralogy” which was trans- 
lated into several languages. He called 
the heavy mineral now known as cerite 
“ tungstein of Pastnds ” Hence Scheele 
thought it might contain tungsten. 


discovered instead the new earth ceria.§ 


In his “Early Recollections of a Chemist,” Wohler gives a charming 
picture of Hisinger's home : M 


After a five days’ stay at Fahlun [he writes] we drove to Skinnskatte- 
berg, Hisinger’s estate, where, after a drive of twenty-four hours, we 

* See Part IV, pp. 70-3, for biographical sketch. 

t The element was named for the planet Ceres, which had been recently dis- 
covered by Piazzi. 

§ In volumes 9 and ip of Nicholson's Journal this paper was accredited to W. 
D’Hesinger and J. B. Bergelius (sic!). 



324 


Discovery of the Elements 


arrived one afternoon, finding Berzelius there. The venerable, genial, 
and most original Hisinger, so well known through his contributions 
to the geognostic mineralogy and botany of Sweden, and through the 
liberality with which he had supported Berzelius during the commence- 
ment of his studies, lived here a very rich man (Brukspatron) on a 
princely estate, surrounded by magnificent forests, gardens, and iron 
mines. We spent a week here most delightfully, partly occupied in 
examining his collections, with making blowpipe tests of unknown min- 
erals, and with the reading aloud of my translation of Hisinger’s “Min- 
eral Geography.” In company with Berzelius and Hisinger, we made 
an excursion a few miles distant to the mines of Riddarhyttan, among 



Skinnskatteberg, Vestmanland, Sweden, Where Wilhelm Hisinger Used 

to Live 

The mineral cerite was first found in one of the mines on his estate. 

which the Bastnashaft is known as the only locality for the occurrence 
of cerite n At the mouth of this mine, which at that time had already 
been abandoned, we collected in the scorching sun hundreds of the 
most characteristic specimens of cerite and cerin [allanite] (13). 

Hisinger was indeed one of Sweden’s most eminent mineralogists and 
geologists. He died on June 28, 1852, at the venerable age of eighty-five 
years, 

Gahn in Sweden and Vauquelin in France tried in vain to obtain me- 
tallic cerium. Mosander prepared anhydrous cerous chloride and sub- 
jected it for a long time to the action of potassium vapor. After washing 
the residue with cold alcohol, he obtained a brown powder which,- 




Cerium and Thorium 


325 


when burnished, ex- 
hibited a dark metallic 
luster. This cerium 
was far from pure, 
however, for it was 
badly contaminated 
with the oxychloride. 
Impure cerium was 
also prepared by 
Wohler. Hillebrand 
and Norton (27) 
succeeded in 1875 in 
preparing the metal in 
a coherent form by 
electrolyzing fused 
cerous chloride. In 
1911 the late Dr. Alcan 
Hirsch (SO) made 
some electrolytic ce- 
rium containing only 
two per cent of im- 
purities (iron, cerium 
oxide, and cerium car- 
bide) . The metal was 
purified by amalga- 
mating it and distil- 
ling off the mercury in 
an evacuated quartz 
tube lined with mag- 
nesia. This elaborate 



From " Industry in Sweden” Federation of Swedish Industries 


Mine Head-Frame at Riddarhyttan 

The mineral cerite was discovered there in 1781 by 
Wilhelm von Hisinger. Georg Brandt, the discoverer 
of cobalt, was born at Riddarhyttan. 


investigation required 

more than three years of work at the University of Wisconsin. 

Cerium forms with iron a peculiar pyrophoric alloy which, when struck, 
emits showers of sparks, and which is used somewhat in the manufacture of 
automatic gas-lighters (28). 

Thorium 


While analyzing one of the rare minerals from the Fahlun district, Ber- 
zelius found in 1815 a substance that he believed to be the oxide of a new 
metal which he named thorium in honor of the ancient Scandinavian 
god, Thor. Ten years later he himself found that this substance was not 
a new earth, but simply yttrium phosphate. He evidently liked the name 
thorium, however, for when in 1829 he really did discover a new element, 
he christened it with the same name (45). 


326 


Discovery of the Elements 



William Francis Hillebrand* 
1853-1925 

Chemist with the U. S. Geological 
Survey, later Chief Chemist at the 
Bureau of Standards. President of the 
American Chemical Society in 1906. 
Author of “The Analysis of Silicate and 
Carbonate Rocks." He was the first 
to suggest the possibility of recovering 
potash from the fumes from cement 
kilns. 

like gadolinite from Ytterby ; the 
exterior presents sometimes a thin 
rust-colored surface layer (12). 

This mineral, which is now known as 
thorite, consists essentially of thorium 
silicate, ThSi0 4 (50). 

Thorium, like the other metals of 
this group, is isolated with great 
difficulty. Berzelius prepared the 
impure metal by heating a mixture 
of potassium and potassium thorium 
fluoride in a glass tube. D. Lely, 
Jr., and L. Hamburger prepared it 


In his account of the discovery, 
Berzelius wrote: 

The mineral on which I made 
the following experiments is found 
in the syenite on the island of 
Lovo near Brevig, Norway. It 
was discovered by the pastor 
Esmarck, son of Jens Esmarck, 
famous professor at the University 
of Christiania. It is the latter 
who sent me a specimen, asking 
me to examine it, because, on ac- 
count of its high specific gravity, 
he believed it to be the earth of 
tantalum. This mineral is black, 
with no indication of crystalline 
form or texture, and looks exactly 



Thomas H. Norton f 
1851-1941 


Professor of chemistry at the Uni- 
versity of Cincinnati. American 
consul at Harput, Turkey, at Smyrna, 
and at Chemnitz, Saxony. Author of 
books on dyes, the cottonseed in- 
dustry, potash production, and the 
utilization of atmospheric nitrogen. 
Collaborator with W. F. Hillebrand 
in researches on cerium (4$), (49). 


* See Allen, "Pen Portrait of William Francis Hillebrand, 1853 -’1925," J, Chem. 
Educ., 9, 72-83 (Jan., 1932). 

> t See Ind.Eng. Chetn., News Ed., 13, 318-9 (Aug. 10, 1935). 


Literature Cited 


327 


99 percent pure by distilling sodium and 
thorium chloride into an exhausted steel 
cylinder and also succeeded in obtain- 
ing it as a coherent metal (P), (41). 
It is interesting to note that all four of 
the elements of this group, titanium, 
cerium, zirconium, and thorium, were 
isolated with the aid of the alkali metals 
discovered by Sir Humphry Davy . 

In 1898 Mme. Curie in Paris and 
Professor G. C. Schmidt at the Uni- 
versity of Munster, working inde- 
pendently, found that thorium, like 
uranium, is radioactive (43) . This dis- 
covery opened up a vast new field of 
research as a result of which thorium 
is now known to be the parent sub- 
stance of an entire series of radioactive 
elements. The story of their discovery 
will be reserved, however, for a later 
chapter. 

Literature Cited 

(/) Klaproth, M. H., “Ueber die vorge- 
gebene Reduction der einfachen Er- 
den,” Crell's Ann., 15, 119 (1791). . 

(2) “Biographical notice of the Rev. Wil- 
liam Gregor,” Annals of Phil., [1], 11, 
112-4 (Feb., 1818) 



From Sdderbaum’s Jac . Berzelius Brev 

Wilhelm Hisingkr 
1766-1852 

Swedish mineralogist and geologist. 
Owner of the famous Riddarhytta 
mining property in Vestmanland, where 
cerite was discovered. He was one of 
the first to analyze the lithium mineral 
petalite. 


( 3 ) Soderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius Bref,” Vol. 3, part 6, Almqvist and Wiksells, 
Upsala, 1912-1914, p. 47. Letter of Berzelius to Thomson, Autumn, 1816. 

(4) Poggendorff, J. C., “Biographisch-Literarisches Handworterbuch zur Geschichte 
der exakten Wissenschaften,” 6 vols., Verlag Chemie, Leipzig and Berlin, 1863- 
1937. Article on Gregor. 

(5) Gregor, W., “Beobachtungen und Versuche fiber den Menakanite, einen in 
Cornwall gefundenen magnetischen Sand,” Crell's Ann., 15, 40-54, 103-19 (1791). 

(6) Thomson, Thomas, “History of Chemistry,” Vol. 2, Colburn and Bentley, 
London, 1831, p. 231. 

(7) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” Vol. 2, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
339-40. 


(8) Klaproth, M. H., “Analytical Essays towards Promoting the Chemical Knowl- 
edge of Mineral Substances,” Cadell and Davies, London, 1801 , pp. 200-10. 

( 9 ) Mellor, J. W., “Comprehensive Treatise on Inorganic and Theoretical Chem- 
istry/ 1 Vol. 7, Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1927 , pp. 1-2, 98-9, 174-8. 
Articles on Titanium, Zirconium, and Thorium. 

{10) W6hler, F., “Sur le titane," letter to Pelouze, Compt. rend., 29, 505 (Nov. 5, 
1849); F. WOhler and H. Ste. -Claire Dbvillb, “M&noiresur l'affinit^ sp&riale 


328 


Discovery of the Elements 


de l’azote pour le titane,” Compt. rend., 45, 480-3 (Oct. 5, 1857); “Recherche* sur 
le titane et son affinity sp4ciale pour l'azote,” Ann. chim. phys., [3], 52, 92-7 
(Jan., 1858). 

(11) NordbnskiOld, A. E., “Scheeles nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnungen,” 
Norstedt & Sdner, Stockholm, 1892, p. 351. 

(12) Jagnaux,R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (7), Vol. 2, pp. 195-9. 

(13) WOhler, F., “Early recollections of a chemist,” translated by Laura R. Joy, Am. 
Chemist , 6, 131 (Oct., 1875); “Jugend-Erinnerungen eines Chemikers,” Ber., 8, 
838-52 (1875). 

(14) Revelation, 21:20. 

(15) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie,” ref. (7), Vol. 2, p. 176 

(16) Gregor, W., “Experiments on a mineral substance formerly supposed to be zeolite, 
with some remarks on two species of uran-glimmer,” Proc. Roy. Soc. London , 
1, 209-10 (July 4, 1805). 

(17) Gregor, W., “On a native arseniate of lead,” Proc. Roy. Soc. London , 1, 331 (Apr. 
13, 1809) Communicated by Chas. Hatchett. 

(18) WOhler, F., “Note sur le titane,” Ann. chim. phys., [3], 28, 382-3 (Mar., 1850); 
[3], 29, 166-87 (June, 1850); Phil. Mag., [3], 36, 67-8 (Jan., 1850); “Ueber die 
Natur des metallischen Titans,” Ann., 73, 34-49 (1850). 

(19) Wollaston, W. H., “On metallic titanium,” Annals of Phil., [1], 21, 67 -8 (Jan , 
1823). 

(20) Berzelius, J. J., Pogg. Ann., 4, 3 (1825). 

(21) Klaproth, M.H., “A nalytical Essays towards Promoting the Chemical Knowledge 
of Mineral Substances,” ref. (8), pp? 499-509. 

(22) Rose, H., Pogg. Ann., 16, 57 (1829). 

(23) Thornton, W. M., Jr., “Titanium,” Chem. Catalog Co., New York City, 1927, 
pp. 42-5. 

(24) Nilson, L. F. and S. O. Pettersson, “liber einige physikalische Konstanten 
des Germaniums und Titans,” Z. physik. Chem., 1, 27-8 (Feb., 1887). 

(25) Moissan, H., “Preparation et propri£tes du titane,” Compt. rend., 120, 290-6 
(Feb 11,1895). 

(26) Hunter, M. A., “Metallic titanium,” J. Am. Chem. Soc., 32, 330-6 (Mar., 1910). 

(27) Hillebrand, W, F. and T. H. Norton, Pogg. Ann., 155, 631 (1875); 156, 466 
(1875). 

(28) Levy, “The Rare Earths,” Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1915, pp. 314-7. 

(29) Hisinger, W. and J. J. Berzelius, “Account of cerium, a new metal found in a 
mineral substance from Bastnas, in Sweden,” Nicholson's J., 9, 290-300 (Dec., 
1804); 10, 10-2 (Jan., 1805); J. J. Berzelius, “Analyse de la gadolinite,” Ann . 
chim. phys., [2], 3, 26-34 (Sept., 1816). 

(30) Hirsch, A., “The preparation and properties of metallic cerium,” Met. Chem. 
Eng., 9, 540-4 (Oct., 1911). 

(31) Klaproth, M. H., “Kleine mineralogische Beitrage,” CreiVs Ann., 11, 7 (1789) 
Ann. chim . phys., [1], 1, 6 (1789). 

(32) Klaproth, M. H.,“ Analytical Essays towards Promoting the Chemical Knowledge 
of Mineral Substances,” ref. (8), pp. 175-94. 

(33) Ibid., pp, 195-9. 

(34) Morveau, G., “Sur PHyacmte de France, coilgenere & celle de Ceylan, et sur la 
nouvelle terre qui entre dans sa composition,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 21, 72-95 
(Jan., 1797). 

(35) “Extralt 4 f un m6moire du Cit. Vauquelin, contenant Panalyse comparative des 



Literature Cited 


329 


Hyacinthes de Ceylan et d’Expailly, et Texpos£ de quelques-unes des propri£t£s 
de la terre qu’elles contiennent,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 22 , 179-210 (May, 1797). 

(36) “Extrait d’une lettre de M. Berzelius & M. Dulong,” Ann. chim. phys., [2], 26, 
43(1824). 

(37) Venable, F. P„ “Zirconium and Its Compounds,” Chem. Catalog Co., New York 
City, 1922 , pp. 22-6. 

(38) Weiss, L. and E. Naumann, “Darstellung und Untersuchung regulinischen, 
Zirkoniums,” Z. anorg. Chem., 65, 248-78 (Jan. 8, 1910). 

(39) Wedekind, E. and Lewis, “Studien liber das elementare Zirkonium,” Ann., 371 , 
366-87 (Heft 3, 1910); E. Wedekind, Ann., 395 , 149-94 (Heft 2, 1912). 

(40) Moissan, H., “Sur la volatilisation de la silice et de la zircone et sur la reduction de 
ces composes par le charbon,” Compt. rend., 116, 1222-4 (May 29, 1893). 

(41) Lely, D. and L. Hamburger, “Herstellung der Elemente Thorium, Uran, 
Zirkon, und Titan,” Z. anorg . Chem., 87, 209-28 (May 26, 1914), 

(43) Venable, F. P., “Zirconium and Its Compounds,” ref. (37), pp. 126-32. 

(43) “Classic of science: Radioactive substances by Mme. Curie,” Set. News Letter 

14, 137-8 (Sept. 1, 1928). 

(44) “Classic of science: Account of experiments made on a mineral called cerite, and 
on the particular substance which it contains, and which has been considered as 
a new metal, by M. Vauquehn,” Set. News Letter, 20, 138 (Aug, 29, 1931), 

(45) Soderbaum, H. G., “Jac. Berzelius levnadsteckning,” Almqvist & Wiksells Bok- 
tryckeri-A-B., Upsala, 1929 - 31 , Vol. 2, pp. 66-8, 501-7. 

(46) Anon., “Thomas H. Norton receives Lavoisier medal,” I nd. Eng. Chem., News Ed., 

15 , 542 (Dec. 20, 1937). 

(47) “Dictionary of National Biography,” Smith, Elder 8c Co., London, 1890 - 91 , vol. 
23, pp. 89-90. Article on Gregor by G. C. Boase. 

(48) von Euler, Hans, “Sven Otto Pettersson. In meinoriam,” Svensk Kemisk 
Tidskrift , 53 , 28-32 (Jan., 1941). 

(4.9) “Necrology. Thomas H. Norton,” Ind. Eng. Chem., News Ed., 19 , 1474 (Dec. 
25, 1941). 

(50) Bull, E. and E. Jansen, “Norsk Biografisk Leksikon,” H. Aschenhoug and Co., 
Oslo, 1926 , vol. 3, pp. 595-6. Articles on the Esmark family. 


XIX. OTHER ELEMENTS ISOLATED WITH THE AID OF 
POTASSIUM AND SODIUM: BERYLLIUM, BORON, 
SILICON, AND ALUMINUM 

When the Abb# Hauy pointed out the close similarity and probable identity 
of beryl and the emerald , Vauquelin analyzed them carefully , and found in 
1798 that they are indeed identical , and that they contain a new earth , which 
he named glucina , but which is now known as beryllia . The metal was iso- 
lated thirty years later by Wohler and Bussy independently. Boron was iso- 
lated in 1808 by Gay-Lussac and Thenar d in France and by Davy in England 
by reduction of boric acid with potassium. Although amorphous silicon was 
prepared by Berzelius in 1824 , the crystalline form of it was not obtained until 
about thirty years later , when Henri Sainte-Claire Deville prepared it by 
an electrolytic method. Aluminum was isolated in 1825 by the Danish physi- 
cist, Oersted , and two years later Wohler prepared it by a better method. Suc- 
cessful commercial processes for the manufacture of this important metal 
were perfected by Henri Sainte-Claire Deville , by Charles Martin Hall , and 
by Dr. Paul L. T. Htroult. 


Aber neue Phaenomena zu erklaren , dieses macht meine 
Sorgen aus , und wie froh is* der Forscher, wenn er das so 
fleissig Gesuchte ftndet, eine Ergotzung wobei das Herz 
lacht (1).* 

Beryllium 

Pliny the Elder realized that beryl and the emerald are closely related 
(56). In speaking of the discovery of beryllium Fourcroy once said, “It is 
to geometry that we owe in some sort the source of this discovery; it is that 
[science] that furnished the first idea of it, and we may say that without 
it the knowledge of this new earth would not have been acquired for a 
long time, since according to the analysis of the emerald by M. Klaproth 
and that of beryl by M. Bindheim one would not have thought it possible 
to recommence this work without the strong analogies or even almost 
perfect identity that Citizen Hauy found for the geometrical properties 
between these two stony fossils” (5). 

As a result of his analysis of a Peruvian emerald, Klaproth had stated 
that this gem has the following composition: 

Silica "silex” Alumina, ** alumin c or argil” Iron oxide 

60.25% 31.25% 0.50% 

To explain his extravagance he said, “For the specimen of emerald sacrificed 
to this analytical process, I am indebted to the liberal kindness of Prince 
Dimitri Gallitzin, whose zeal for the study of mineralogy is most honour- 
ably known” (22). 

* For a. translation of this quotation see page 101. 

330 



Beryllium 


331 


Beryl had also been analyzed by 
Bergman, Achard, Bindheim, and 
Vauquelin, and was supposed to be 
a, calcium aluminum silicate (23). 

The identity of beryl and the emerald 
was not suspected until the famous 
French mineralogist, the Abbd Haiiy, 
made a careful study of their crystal 
forms and physical properties and was 
so struck by the similarity of the 
two minerals that he asked Vauquelin 
to analyze them chemically. 

Although the latter had previously 
overlooked the new earth because of 
its similarity to alumina, he found in 
1798 that the hydroxide that precipi- 
tates when caustic potash is added to 
an acid solution of the beryl does not 
dissolve in an excess of the alkali. 

It also differs from alumina in other 
respects, for it forms no alum, it dis- 
solves in ammonium carbonate, and 
its salts have a sweet taste. Vau- 
quelin ’s paper read before the French 
Academy on “le 26 pluviose an VI” 
of the Revolutionary Calendar, or 
the fifteenth of February, 1798 
(6)* (23), proved that, except for a little chromium in the emerald, the two 
gems have the same composition and that they contain a new earth, a 
sample of which he presented to the Academy. At the suggestion of the 
editors’ 1 ' of the Annales de Chimie et de Physique , he called the new earth 
glucina, meaning sweet. The specimen of beryl that Vauquelin analyzed 
was presented to him by "Citizen Patrin, whose zeal for the advancement 
of the sciences is well known to every one of their cultivators” (23). 

Vauquelin believed that Bergman’s incorrect conclusions as to the 
chemical nature of the beryl had been caused by the unwillingness of his 
“active mind to submit to the details of experiment.” Thus Bergman, 
and Bindheim as well, had entrusted their analyses to young pupils who 
were incapable of distinguishing a new substance when they saw it. Ac- 
cording to Bindheim’s analysis, the beryl consisted of 64 per cent of silica, 
27 per cent of alumina, 8 per cent of lime, and 2 per cent of iron (total 101 
per cent) (23). 

* Guyton-Morveau. Monge, Berthollet. Fourcroy, Seguin, Chaptal, and Vauquelin. 



Front “La Science Francaise,” Dept . Public 
Instruction, Paris 


Ren6-Just Ha#y 
1743-1822 

French mineralogist. He deduced 
the fundamental laws of crystallog- 
raphy, and explained cleavage by pos- 
tulating that a crystal is built up of 
small similar parallelopipeds. He was 
the first to recognize that beryl and the 
emerald are geometrically identical. 
Vauquelin’s proof of their chemical 
identity, made at the suggestion of 
Haiiy, led to the discovery of the ele- 
ment beryllium. 


332 


Discovery of the Elements 



Johann Friedrich Gmelin 
1748-1804 

Father of Leopold Gmelin. Pro- 
fessor of chemistry at Tubingen and 
Gottingen. Famous chemical his- 
torian. His remarkable “ Geschichte 
der Chemie ” was published in 1797-99. 


When Vauquelin analyzed a Peruvian 
emerald (25) after his discovery of chro- 
mium and glucina, the results differed 
greatly from his previous ones and from 
those of Klaproth. He found : 


Silica 64.60 

Alumina 14.00 

Glucina 13.00 

Lime 2 . 56 

Chromium oxide 3.50 

Moisture, or other volatile matter 2.00 


99.66 

J. F. Gmelin’s analysis of a Siberian 
beryl soon confirmed Vauquelin’s con- 
clusions as to the essential constituents 
of that gem, for he found no lime, but 
only silica, alumina, glucina, and a 
small amount of iron oxide (26). 

Since yttria, as well as glucina, forms 
sweet salts, Klaproth preferred to call 
the latter earth beryllia, and it is still 
known by that name. Beryl and the 
emerald are now known to be a 
beryllium aluminum silicate [Be 8 Al 2 - 
(Si0 3 )«]. 


Metallic beryllium was first prepared in August, 1828, by Wohler and 
Bussy independently by the action of potassium on beryllium chloride 
(?)> (5), Wohler placed alternate layers of the chloride and flattened 
pieces of potassium in a platinum crucible, wired the cover on strongly, and 


heated the mixture with an alcohol lamp. The reaction began immediately 
and took place with such intensity that the crucible became white-hot. 


After cooling it thoroughly, he opened 


it and placed it in a large volume of 
water, whereupon the beryllium sepa- 
rated out ias a gray-black powder. 
After washing this insoluble material, 
Wohler saw that it consisted of fine 
metallic particles which could be bur- 
nished to show a dark metallic luster. 
He did not succeed in melting the 
beryllium (8). 



The first person to prepare pure be- 
ryllium by an electrolytic process was 


Hexagonal Crystals of Pure Beryl- 
lium Prepared by P. Lebeau 



Beryllium and Boron 


333 


the French chemist, P. Lebeau (27), 
(29). After adding potassium or so- 
dium fluoride to pure beryllium fluo- 
^--'Vv V;: ride to make it conduct the current, he 

m lwWtijt m placed the mixture in a nickel crucible. 

After melting the double salt with a 
m ohwik a t’fou w>v*u Bunsen burner, he placed the positive 

(graphite) electrode in the fluoride 
mnm& «* wm** : v mixture and connected the nickel cru- 

1 ; M cible to the negative side of a battery 

_ of twenty amperes under eighty volts. 
Dedication Page of Phenard’s “Trait* T t . , f 

de Chimie ” a Five-Volume Work than an hour crystals of beryl- 

lium were deposited on the sides of 
the crucible. After washing them, first with water and then with absolute 
alcohol, and drying them in a vacuum desiccator containing phosphorus pen- 
toxide, Lebeau found that they contained from 99.5 to 99.8 per cent of 
beryllium. This research provided 


ttuimsm tm mntiK a Cicou iumut 
toimaiMQVS, 

m * «.* •«** arj 

ws CtvisUwB. h »*»»», WP. ■, _ , . 


Dedication Page of Thenard’s “Traite 
de Chimie” a Five- Volume Work 


the data for his thesis for the doctorate 
in June, 1898. 

Nearly a century after Wohler and 
Bussy liberated beryllium, Alfred 
Stock and Hans Goldschmidt devised 
the first commercial process, in which 
a mixture of the fluorides of beryllium 
and barium is electrolyzed. The 
molten beryllium separates out at the 
water-cooled iron cathode (24). 

Boron 

There is no conclusive proof that 
the ancients were acquainted with 
borax; even in the eighteenth cen- 
tury, it was believed to be an artifi- 
cial production (59), (60). In 1772, 
however, the Swedish merchant Johan 



Abraham Grill (Abrahamsson) de- 
scribed in volume thirty-four of Louis-Josewi Gav-Lussac 

Vetenskapsacademiens Handlingar a 


natural borax called pounxa sent 
him from Thibet by Jos. Vit. Kuo, a 
native Chinese Catholic missionary. 
“From the report of my correspond- 
ent Vit. Kuo,” said he, “it can be in- 


Professor of chemistry at the Lcole 
Polytechnique and at the Jar din des 
Plantes. With Thenard, he prepared 
potassium without the use of a battery, 
and isolated boron. In 1809 Gay- 
Lussac enunciated his famous law of 
combining volumes of gases. 



334 


Discovery of the Elements 


ferred that the pounxa is found in Thibet, that to obtain it one digs into the 
ground to the depth of two yards;. . .it positively cannot be made arti- 
ficially by heating the earth; it is found already prepared by nature" (61). 

Analyses by R. Nasini and R. Grassini indicate that boric acid entered 
into the composition of the brilliant coral red glazes on the Aretine vases 
(first century B.C. to first century A.D.) excavated at Arezzo (57), (76). 
Because of the seal, or impression, on the bottom, these vases were known 
as “terra sigillata ware." Paul Diergart of the research staff of the Royal 
Porcelain Works in Berlin questioned these analyses, however (58). 

Boric acid was first prepared in 1702 by Wilhelm Homberg. He was 
born on January 8, 1652, at Batavia on the island of Java. When his father 
left the service of the Dutch East India Company, the family settled in 
Amsterdam, where young Wilhelm (or Willem) had a much better oppor- 
tunity to study than in the torrid climate of the East Indies. After study- 
ing law at Jena and Leipzig, he was admitted to the bar in Magdeburg in 
1674. Soon becoming more interested in the laws of nature than in those 
devised by man, he began to devote much time to botany, astronomy, and 
mechanics. 

The Burgomaster of the city, Otto von Guericke, was then performing 
“the Magdeburg miracles" with the* evacuated hemispheres which sixteen 
horses could not separate and with his curious barometer, “the little man 
who remained hidden in a tube when the weather was to be rainy and came 
out when it was to be fair” (62). These wonders still further diverted 
Homberg's attention from his practice of law. 

At Padua and Rome, he studied medicine, optics, art, and music. After 
further study in France, he went to England to work with Robert Boyle, 
thence to the Netherlands, where he studied anatomy, and finally to 
Wurttemberg, where he received the degree of doctor of medicine. Hom- 
berg then visited the mines of Saxony, Hungary, and Bohemia, and went 
to Sweden to see the great copper mine at Fahlun and work with Urban 
Hiarne in the newly established chemical laboratory at Stockholm. When 
Homberg returned to Paris, the Duke of Orleans studied under him, caught 
his enthusiasm, and equipped for him “the most superb and best furnished 
laboratory Chemistry had ever seen" (62). 

In 1702 Homberg stated in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences at 
Paris that he had heated borax with a solution of iron vitriol (ferrous sul- 
fate) and sublimed off with the water vapor a substance which he called sel 
volatil narcotique du vitriol (“volatile sedative salt from the vitrol"). Thus 
it is evident that he must have prepared boric acid and that he believed that 
it came from the ferrous sulfate (63). He used hot water to extract the 
colcothar or residue which remained in the retort after distillation of Nord- 
hausen sulfuric acid, filtered the solution, and mixed with it a hot solution 
of borax. After evaporating the mixture to incipient crystallization, he 



Wilhelm Homberg 


335 


heated it on a sandbath, using a cucurbit and alembic. When the liquid 
products of distillation ceased to drip into the receiver, snow-white plate- 
lets with a mother-of-pearl luster sublimed in the still-head. By redistilling 
the aqueous distillate eight or ten times, Homberg obtained a good yield of 
the “sedative salt” (63). 

F. M. Jaeger found in the correspondence of Elisabeth Charlotte of Or- 
leans (1652-1721) a firsthand character sketch of the discoverer of boric 
acid. “One cannot know Homberg,” said she, “without admiring him for 
his clear mind, — not at all confused as the highly educated usually are, and 
not solemn, but always jolly; everything he knows, even the most difficult 
arts, seem with him to be a jest, as though he were playing tricks. ... He 
has a soft voice, and speaks very slowly but clearly” (64). 

During his last illness, Homberg’s patience “was that of a hero or a saint. 
A few days before his death,” said Fontenelle in his eulogy, “he took the 
liberty of writing to His Royal Highness the Duke of Orleans. . . to recom- 
mend to him all that he had most loved, the widow whom he was about to 
leave and the Academy of Sciences. His prayer for the Academy had more 
success than he would have dared to hope; the prince has reserved for 
himself alone the direct management of this Company. He treats our sci- 
ences like his own domain, of which he is jealous” (62). 

Wilhelm Homberg died on the twenty-fourth of September, 1715. 
“Although he had a weak constitution, he was most industrious; although 
he lacked strength, he had courage to compensate for it. Besides a prodigi- 
ous quantity of curious facts of natural philosophy collected in his mind 
and retained in his memory, he had the qualifications of an ordinary scholar 
in history and languages. He even knew Hebrew. His quality of mind is 
evident in all his work: above all, an ingenious attentiveness which caused 
him to make observations where others saw nothing. . . . 

“We have already mentioned his complete freedom from ostentation,” 
said Fontenelle. “He was equally free from mystery, so common among 
chemists, which is merely another kind of ostentation in which one conceals 
instead of displaying. , . . Although French was always a foreign language 
for him and he naturally was not rich in vocabulary and had continually to 
search for the right word, he always found it. No one ever had more gentle 
manners nor more sociable habits. . . , A wholesome, peaceful philosophy 
made him receive calmly the different events of life, immune to those agita- 
tions for which one has, if one wishes, so many occasions” (62). 

In 1747-8 Theodore Baron de H&iouville (1715-1768) proved that borax 
is composed of “sedative salt” and soda (65). In his “Elective Attrac- 
tions,” Torbern Bergman stated emphatically that the so-called “sedative 
salt“ is not a salt but an acid. “The substance commonly called sedative 
salt,” said he, “is more nearly allied to acids than any other class of bodies. 
It reddens turnsole and saturates alkalis and soluble earths. It also dis- 



336 


Discovery of the Elements 


solves various metals, and has other properties which shew its acid na- 
ture; and it seems better entitled to the name of acid of borax than to that 
of sedative salt” (66). 

After the chemical revolution, “sedative salt” came to be regarded as an 
acidic oxide, boric (or boracic) acid. Even at the close of the eighteenth 
century, its chemical nature was not understood. In a letter to the An- 
nates de Chitnie el de Physique , A. N. Scherer wrote in 1799: “I have just 
been assured that Crell has recognized carbon as the radical of boracic 
acid” (67). 

Lavoisier believed that it contained oxygen, and had mentioned its radi- 
cal in his list of elements* (20). The first proof of the composition of boric 
acid was given in 1808 when Gay-Lussac and Thenard in France and Davy 
in England succeeded in decomposing it by reduction with potassium, and 
in liberating a new element which the French chemists called bore and Sir 
Humphry called boracium. 

Louis-Joseph Gay-Lussac was born at St. Leonard, near Limoges, on 
December 6, 1778, and was therefore just eleven days older than Davy. 

After receiving his elementary educa- 
tion in St. Leonard he went to Paris, 



Louis- Jacques Thenard 
1777-1857 


and when he was nineteen years old, he 
enrolled at the ficole Polytechnique, 
where he soon became acquainted 
with his lifelong friend and collabo- 
rator, Thenard. 

Somewhat later he won the friend- 
ship of Berthollet at the ficole des 
Ponts et Chauss£es, who said to him, 
“Young man, your destiny is to make 
discoveries” (3). For a time he 
worked with Berthollet’s son in a fac- 
tory in Arcueil where chlorine was 
used to bleach linen. On New Year’s 
day in the year 1802 Gay-Lussac be- 
came a rdp^titeur at the ficole Poly- 
technique, where he often substituted 
for Fourcroy in his lectures on chem- 
istry. 


Professor of chemistry at the fecole 
Polytechnique. Discoverer of hydro- 
gen peroxide. Collaborator with Gay- 
Lussac in his researches on potassium, 
boron, iodine, and chlorine. He also 
investigated many fatty acids, esters, 
and ethers. 


Two years later Gay-Lussac and 
Biot made a daring balloon ascension 
to study the behavior of a magnetic 
needle and the chemical composition 
of the atmosphere at high altitudes. 


See Part XV, pp. 272. 


337 


L.-J. Gay-Lussac 

On another occasion, when Gay-Lussac alone had reached an elevation of 
7016 meters and wished to ascend still higher, he threw overboard some 
small objects to lighten the balloon. A shepherdess in the field was 
astonished to see a white wooden chair fall from the sky into some 



From A p pit ton’s ** Beginners’ fyond-Book of Chemistry ” 

Gay-Lussac and Biot Making Their Balloon Ascension 
Gay-Lussac was then twenty-five years old. 


bushes, and the peasants who heard her story were at a loss to explain 
why, if the chair had come direct from Heaven, the workmanship on 
it should be so crude (3). 

After a period of extended travel and study in Italy with von Humboldt, 



338 


Discovery of the Elements 


Gay-Lussac returned to the ficole Polytechnique and began a long series 
of researches with Thenard. Louis-Jacques Thenard,* a carpenter’s son, 
was bom at La Loupti£re near Nogen t-sur-Seine on May 4, 1777. After 
receiving private instruction from the village priest, he went to Paris to 
study chemistry, where, after three years of hard study and severe priva- 
tions, he finally succeeded in winning the recognition of Vauquelin and 
Fourcroy. The latter scientist had befriended the poor peasant boy 



From Gay-Lussac and Thenard' s “ Recherches Physico-Chymiques" 


The Great Battery That Napoleon Presented to the £colb Polytrchniqur 

The scale is 25 mm. for 1 meter. Figs. 1 and 2. Elevation and plan of the great 
battery. Figs. 3 and 4. Elevation and plan of two cells, a, a, a. Barrels containing 
liquid for filling the troughs. b t b t b . Barrels containing water for washing the troughs. 
e,c,c . Lead siphons for the flow of liquid from the barrels. d,d,d. Conduits for re- 
ceiving liquid from the barrels by means of the siphons, and conducting it into the 
troughs. e,e t e. Wires connecting the different cells of the battery, fjj. Trough for 
receiving liquid from all the cells by means of the individual troughs, g,g. 


Vauquelin in his early struggles, and now Vauquelin in turn helped Thenard 
to obtain a teaching position in a Parisian pension. In 1798 Gay-Lussac 
and Thenard met at the ficole Polytechnique, where both later became 
professors. 

When the news of Davy’s isolation of the alkali metals reached Paris 
in 1808, Napoleon provided Gay-Lussac and Thenard with a powerful 
voltaic pile. Before it could be set up, however, they showed that these 
metals can be obtained without a battery simply by reducing the caustic 
alkali with metallic iron at a high temperature, a method which Davy 

* He always spelled his name thus, without the acute accent over the *. 




Boron 


339 


soon adopted in preference to his own. The potassium which the French 
chemists prepared in this manner was soon put to good use when they 
attempted to decompose boric acid. 

On June 21, 1808, a note from Gay-Lussac and Thenard was read before 
the Institute. It announced that the results they had obtained by treating 
boric acid with potassium could be explained only by admitting that 
that acid is composed of a combustible substance and oxygen (21). At 
the time this notice was read, Gay-Lussac was seriously ill as the result 
of an explosion in which he had almost lost his sight (30). 


Before regarding their 
proof as complete Gay-Lus- 
sac and Thenard wished not 
only to decompose boric acid, 
but to recompose it. On No- 
vember 30 of the same year 
they were able to state in the 
A nnales de Chimie et de Phy- 
sique that “the composition 
of boracic add is no longer 
problematical. In fact, ’ ’ said 
they, “we decompose and we 
recompose this acid at will." 
Their method was as follows : 

To decompose it, place 
equal parts of metal 
[potassium] and very 
pure, vitreous boracic 
acid in a copper tube 
to which a tube of bent 
glass is attached. Place 
the copper tube in a small 
furnace, with the end of 
the glass tube in a flask 
of mercury. When the 
apparatus is ready, heat 
the copper tube gradu- 
ally until it becomes 
faintly red; keep it in 
this condition for several 
minutes; then, the op- 
eration being ended, 
allow it to cool and take 
out the material. 



On the First Page op Their "Recherches 
Physico-Chimtques" Gay-Lussac and Thenard 
Thank Napoleon for the Large Battery 
That He Had Presented to the Ecolb Poly- 

TBCHNIQUB. 


Gay-Lussac and Thenard then gave a detailed description of the experi- 
ment, saying: 



340 


Discovery of the Elements 


When the temperature is about 150 degrees, the mixture suddenly 
glows strongly, which appears in a striking manner if a glass tube 
is used. So much heat is produced that the glass tube melts slightly 
and sometimes breaks, and the air is almost always driven out of the 
vessel with force. From the beginning to the end of the experiment, 
only atmospheric air is released, with a few bubbles of hydrogen gas, 
which do not amount to the fiftieth part of that given off when the 

metal combines with water. The 
metal [potassium] is used up de- 
composing part of the boracic acid ; 
and these two substances are con- 
verted by their mutual reaction 
into an olive gray material which 
is a mixture of potassium, potas- 
sium borate, and the radical of 
boracic acid. Extract this mixture 
in a tube by pouring water into 
it and heating slowly, and sepa- 
rate the boracic radical by washing 
with cold or hot water. That 
which does not dissolve is the 
radical itself. . . 

By burning the new “radical' ' in 
oxygen, or, better still, by oxidizing it 
vigorously with potassium chlorate, 
potassium nitrate, or nitric acid, Gay- 
Lussac and Thenard were able to make 
some synthetic boric acid, a sample 
of which they presented to the Insti- 
tute. As a result of their experiments 
Rapfaello Nasini they concluded “that this body, which 

1854-1931 we now propose to call bore, is of a 



Italian chemist who reported the 
presence of boric acid in the glazes of 
ancient Aretine vases, and studied the 
rare gases of the boric acid soffioni, or 
hot springs, of Tuscany. In his youth 
he assisted Stanislao Cannizzaro and in 
later life he collaborated with Giacomo 
Ciamkian. 


definite nature, and can be placed be- 
side carbon, phosphorus, and sulfur; 
and we are led to think that to pass 
into the state of boracic acid it requires 
a great quantity of oxygen, but that be- 
fore arriving at that state it first passes 


through that of the oxide" (21), (38). 


In the following year Gay-Lussac gave an even greater contribution to 


chemistry, his statement of the famous law of combining volumes. In later 
life he taught chemistry both at the ficole Polytechnique and at the Jardin 


des Plantes. After Courtois discovered iodine in 1811, Gay-Lussac and 
Thenard made a thorough study of its properties, and published their 
results in a memoir now treasured by chemists as a great scientific classic. 
Gay-Lussac died in Paris on May 9, 1850 (3). Davy once said of him, 



Boron and Silicon 


341 


4 ‘Gay-Lussac was quick, lively, ingenious, and profound, with great activity 
of mind, and great facility of manipulation. I should place him at the head 
of all the living chemists of France’ 1 ( 4 ). 

Besides carrying out many inorganic researches with Gay-Lussac, 
Thenard made important contributions to organic chemistry. He outlived 
his famous collaborator by seven years, and when he died on June 21, 
1857, at the age of eighty years, his native village honored him by changing 
its name to La Loupti&re-Thenard ( 3 ). 

Davy’s method of isolating boron was very similar to that of the French 
chemists. While engrossed in the study of the alkalies, he had passed a 
current through boric acid and had noticed a dark, combustible substance 
at the negative pole, but had not at that time thoroughly investigated it 
{ 36 ). In the following year, however, he placed a mixture of boric acid and 
potassium in a copper tube and heated it to dull redness for fifteen minutes. 
When he examined the contents, he found that the potassium had dis- 
appeared and that in its place there was an olive-gray powder which did 
not effervesce when treated with water or with acids. Davy’s paper 
announcing the discovery of metallic boron was read before the Royal 
Society on June 30, 1808 ( 28 ), ( 30 ). 

In 1909, Dr. E. Weintraub of the General Electric Company ran high- 
potential alternating current arcs between cooled copper electrodes in a 
mixture of boron chloride with a large excess of hydrogen ( 51 ), obtaining 
pure fused boron which differed greatly in properties from the impure 
amorphous product of earlier workers. 

Silicon 

Although Sir Humphry Davy felt certain that silica is not an element, he 
was unable to decompose it with his powerful voltaic pile, and was also 
unsuccessful in his attempts to isolate silicon by passing potassium vapor 
over red-hot silica. Gay-Lussac and Thenard observed that silicon tetra- 
fluoride and potassium react violently when the metal is heated, and that a 
reddish brown, combustible solid is obtained. This was probably very 
impure amorphous silicon ( 37 ), ( 39 ). 

Berzelius heated a mixture of silica, iron, and carbon to a very high 
temperature, and obtained iron silicide. When he decomposed this with 
hydrochloric acid, silica was precipitated, and the amount of hydrogen 
evolved was in excess of the iron, indicating that some other metal must be 
present ( 9 ). 

Berzelius finally showed in 1824 that this other seemingly metallic 
substance was derived from the silica, and succeeded in preparing the 
amorphous form of it by two methods. In the first of these he heated 
potassium in an atmosphere of silicon tetrafluoride gas, as Gay-Lussac 
and Thenard had done, and obtained a brown mass. When this was thrown 



342 


Discovery of the Elements 


into water, hydrogen was freely evolved, and the new element silicon was 
precipitated as a dark brown, insoluble powder containing potassium 
fluosilicate, which is difficultly soluble. Although Davy, Thenard, and 
Gay-Lussac had all handled the brown powder before, only Berzelius had 
the patience for the prolonged washing required to remove the fluosilicate 
(9), (32). 

In his other method Berzelius heated the potassium fluosilicate with 
excess potassium. The resulting potassium silicide was easily decomposed 
with water, the amorphous silicon settling to the bottom. 

Nothing is easier [said he] than to procure this substance; the 
following is the method I have adopted: The double fluate of silica 
and potash, or soda, heated nearly to redness to drive off the hygro- 
metric water, is put into a glass tube, closed at one end. Bits of po- 
tassium are added and mixed with the powder by fusing the metal and 
gently rapping the tube. It is then heated by the spirit-lamp, and 
before it is red-hot, a feeble detonation ensues and the silicium is re- 
duced. The mass is suffered to cool, and then treated with water as 
long as it dissolves anything. Hydrogen gas is at first evolved, in con- 
sequence of siliciuret of potassium having been formed, which cannot 
exist in water. 

The washed substance [continued Berzelius] is a hydruret of sili- 
cium, which, at a red heat, burns vividly in oxygen gas, although the 
silicium is not thereby completely oxidated; it is then heated in a 
covered platina crucible, the heat being slowly raised to redness. The 
hydrogen alone is oxidated, and the silicium is now no longer combus- 
tible in oxygen, but chlorine attacks it readily. The small portion of 
silica that is formed may be dissolved by fluoric [hydrofluoric] acid. 

If silicium has not been exposed to a strong red heat, the acid dis- 
solves it, with a slow disengagement of hydrogen. According to my 
synthetical experiments, silica contains 0.52 of its weight of oxygen. 

Berzelius' product was impure amorphous silicon. Zirconium may be ob- 
tained by an analogous process {32), 

The first crystalline silicon was prepared by Henri Sainte-Claire Deville 
in 1854 (9), (31): In the course of his researches on aluminum, he de- 
composed an impure sodium aluminum chloride with the voltaic pile, and 
obtained a gray, brittle, granular melt containing 10.3 per cent silicon. 
When he dissolved away the aluminum, some shining platelets remained. 

Sainte-Claire Deville explained his results by saying that an alloy 
often behaves like a true solution of one metal in another. “Thus it 
is,” said he, “that carbon, boron, and silicon, dissolving like metals in 
iron and in aluminum, separate from them in cooling, and can be obtained 
in the crystalline state by the use of reagents which act on the aluminum 
and the iron without attacking the carbon, the boron, and the silicon. 
This is the principle of the method which has served for the preparation of 
the last two metalloids in the adamantine state/' In spite of the metallic 
luster of Ms crystalline silicon, he realized that the element was not a true 



Silicon and Aluminum 


343 


metal. “On the contrary,” said he, “I think this new form of silicon bears 
the same relation to ordinary silicon that graphite does to carbon' * (33), 
(34), (35). 

Aluminum 

Aluminum is the most abundant metal on the earth s surface and one 
of the most useful ones, yet it remained unknown for many centuries. 
Early alum works in Phocis near Ionia and in Lesbos sold their product to 
the Turks for the manufacture of brilliant Turkey red (68), (69). The 
manufacture was also carried on in Syria, at Foya Nova near Smyrna, and 
at Constantinople. In 1254 A.D., Friar William De Rubruquis (Ruys- 
broek) wrote in his journal, “I found many Frankes at Iconium [Konia], 
and a certaine Januensian Marchant, called Nicholas de Sancto Syrio. 
Who with a certaine companion of his a Venetian, called Boniface de Molen- 
dino, carried all the Allum out of Turkic, so that the Soldan could not sell 
any, but to those two : and they made it so deare, that what was wont to be 
sold for fifteene Bizantians, is now sold for fifty” (70). 

In about 1459 Bartholomew Perdix (Bartolomeo Perdice, or Pernice), a 
Genoese merchant who had been in Syria, found a rock suitable for alum 
on the island of Ischia;' he has been regarded as the first to introduce this 
industry into Europe (68). Gino Testi gives evidence, however, that alum 
was manufactured in Italy long before this. He quotes a passage from Dio- 
dorus Siculus (first century B.C.) which shows that the Romans profitably 
exported alum from Lipari for use in Phoenician dyeing. According to 
Testi, the alum mines on the island of Ischia have been known since the 
twelfth century A.D., and Perdice, already aware of their richness, brought 
skilled workmen from Genoa who had learned the trade in Rocca (Orfa) 
but had fled from Asia because of the Turkish conquests (71). 

Before 1454 Giovanni de Castro learned the process at Constantinople. 
On returning to Italy after that city had fallen into the hands of the Turks 
he happened to find, in about 1462, in the barren hills near Tolfa, some 
holly plants like those he had seen growing near the alum mines in Syria. 
On searching, he found some white stones similar to the Syrian ore from 
which alum was prepared (72). Unemployed alum-workers, brought from 
Genoa, “thanked God for having restored to them their means of subsist- 
ence.” For this discovery Pius II granted Giovanni de Castro a generous 
annuity and had a statue erected in his honor (71). In the alum works at 
Tolfa, Genoese workmen dissolved the calcined rock in a large volume of 
water, boiled the lye in leaden caldrons, and allowed it to evaporate spon- 
taneously in wooden vats (69), (72). The so-called “Roman alum” pro- 
duced there was the double basic potassium alum, which crystallizes in 
cubes rather than octahedra (71), (73). 

Although G. E. Stahl and Caspar Neumann both believed that alum 



344 


Discovery of the Elements 


contained lime, J. H. Pott was unable to prepare it from lime and vitriolic 
acid, but always obtained merely selenite (calcium sulfate) {74). When 
Stahl leached with water a broken clay tube he had used for distilling spirit 
of vitriol (sulfuric acid), he obtained crystals of alum (74). Pott, too, pre- 
pared alum from clay and sulfuric acid (74). 

In an attempt to determine the composition of alum, A. S. Marggraf in 
1754 added pure alkali to several pounds of it and precipitated what he 
called the “earth of alum” (Alaunerde). After he had thoroughly washed 
and dried this alumina, he tried in vain to regenerate the alum by adding 
sulfuric acid. 

Marggraf then collected clays from various places in Germany, Silesia, 
and Poland, and distilled them with sulfuric acid, but obtained no satisfac- 
tory crystals of alum. When he added fixed alkali in the proper amount, 
however, he obtained beautiful, large crystals of it (74). 

Marggraf noticed that, when he dissolved the earth from alum in nitric 
acid, evaporated the solution, and calcined the residue, he merely regener- 
ated the “earth” but obtained no “Balduin’s phosphorus” (calcium nitrate). 
He realized, therefore, that the earth in alum must be different from that 
in chalk or limestone. He also demonstrated the presence of alumina in 
clay and in roofing slate (74). 

Marggraf was born in Berlin on March 3, 1709, studied chemistry and 
pharmacy first under his father and then under Caspar Neumann, took the 
medical course at Halle, and received further chemical and metallurgical 
training in Freiberg from the famous director of mines, J. Fr Henckel. He 
devoted fifty years of his life to scientific research, and was a pioneer in 
analytical chemistry. He proved that potash and soda are different, that 
calamine contains a peculiar metal, zinc, and that alumina, magnesia, and 
lime are three distinct earths, and was one of the first persons to prepare 
phosphorus. Marggraf died in his native city on August 7, 1782, at the 
age of seventy-three years. D. Lorenz Crell called him the second father 
of European analytical chemistry (10), and he must also have been a great 
teacher. One of his most famous pupils was Franz Karl Achard (40). 

Condorcet once said of Marggraf, “Perhaps no physicist ever so com- 
pletely excluded every system and hypothesis. . .if, for example, he admits 
Stahl’s doctrine on phlogiston, one would think, from the reserve with which 
he speaks of it, that he had a presentiment that this doctrine, then so 
widely accepted, would soon, at least, be overthrown. His memoirs con- 
fine themselves to the statement of the facts. . .his results have a precision 
which was not known before him. . (75). 

In his eulogy, Condorcet said that “M. Marggraf had a kind, good- 
natured, happy temperament; his only distraction and his greatest pleas- 
ure except study was a small circle of friends and enlightened men who 
could understand him and to whom he could say what be believed’ ' (75). . 



Oersted Isolates Aluminum 


345 


The attempts of Berzelius and Davy to use the voltaic current for isolat- 
ing the metal present in alumina were unsuccessful. Although most 
chemical historians credit Wohler with the first isolation of aluminum, the 
claims of Oersted cannot be lightly dismissed (11), (42). 

Hans Christian Oersted (41) was bom on Langeland Island in southern 
Denmark in 1777, the year in which Lavoisier overthrew the phlogiston 


theory. His father was a rather un- 
successful apothecary, who had very 
little money for the education of his 
children. Hans Christian learned 
arithmetic alone out of an old 
schoolbook and sometimes received 
a little instruction from private tu- 
tors. When he was twelve years 
old he became his father’s assist- 
ant in the pharmacy, where he 
soon learned to enjoy his chemical 
duties. As he was very eager to 
attend the University of Copen- 
hagen, he studied conscientiously 
until, at the age of seventeen years, 
he had earned the coveted certificate 
(Reifezeugnis) entitling him to ma- 
triculation. His studies at Copen- 
hagen included science, philosophy, 
and medicine, and at the age of 
twenty-two years he received the 
degree of Doctor of Medicine. 

At this time he began to lecture on 
chemistry and metaphysics, and 
took over the management of a 
pharmacy. After Volta’s discovery 
became known, Oersted immedi- 
ately became interested in physics 
and electricity. When he visited 
the famous universities in Germany, 
the scientists he met were charmed 
by his active mind, his youthful en- 
thusiasm, and- his almost childlike 
appearance and bearing. In 1806 



From Oersted's “ The Soul itt Nature ” 


Hans Christian Oersted 
,1777-1851 

Danish physicist, chemist, physician, 
and pharmacist. Discoverer of the mag- 
netic action of the electric current. The 
first person to isolate the metal aluminum. 


he became a professor of physics at the University of Copenhagen. His 


fame rests chiefly on his epoch-making discovery of the magnetic action of 
the electric current and the close relation between electricity and magnetism. 



346 


Discovery of the Elements 


In 1825, however, he studied the chemical action of the voltaic current, 
and tried to isolate chemically the metal believed to be present in alumina. 
He first prepared liquid aluminum chloride by passing a current of chlorine 
gas over a mixture of charcoal and alumina heated to redness. By allow 
ing potassium amalgam to react with the aluminum chloride, he prepared an 
aluminum amalgam, and by distilling off the mercury out of contact with 
the air, he obtained a metal that looked like tin (II). 

Oersted gave the following description of his method : 

The compound of chlorine with the combustible element of the 
clay (aluminum chloride) is volatile at a temperature which is not 
much above that of boiling water; it is somewhat yellowish, perhaps 
however from admixed carbon ; it is soft, but still has crystalline form ; 
it absorbs water with avidity and dissolves therein with great ease and 
with evolution of heat. Rapidly heated with potassium amalgam, it 
is decomposed, potassium chloride and aluminum amalgam being 
formed. This amalgam is very quickly decomposed in contact with 
the atmosphere. By distillation without contact with the atmosphere, 
it forms a lump of metal which in color and luster somewhat resembles 
tin. Moreover the author has found, both in the amalgam and the 
aluminum, remarkable properties which do not permit him to regard 
the experiments as complete, but show promising prospects of impor- 
tant results (42), (43). 

Oersted’s product must have been impure, metallic aluminum contain- 
ing mercury, but when Wohler repeated the experiment he found that the 
gray molten mass formed by the action of the potassium amalgam on the 
aluminum chloride volatilized completely when heated (12), (46). Kirstine 
Meyer’s careful study of Oersted’s unpublished notes and I. Fogh’s and 
Tosterud and Edwards’ repetitions of his experiment show that the great 
Danish physicist allowed a dilute amalgam containing about 1.5 per cent of 
potassium to react with excess aluminum chloride, and that it is possible to 
prepare the metal in this manner (42), (44), (45), (53). 

Since Oersted’s results were published in an obscure Danish journal, 
they made little impression on the scientific world. Nevertheless, his 
discovery of electromagnetism brought him the prizes, honors, and in- 
fluence he so richly deserved. He lived to be seventy-four years old (41). 

Friedrich Wohler, one of the most versatile chemists Germany ever 
produced, was born in the little village of Eschersheim near Frankfort-on- 
the-Main on July 31, 1800. His father, who himself had a keen apprecia- 
tion of Nature and a liking for experimentation, delighted to see the same 
tastes and talents develop in the young child. At the age of fourteen years 
WOhler entered the gymnasium at Frankfort, where he was regarded as an 
average student. As he was passionately absorbed in collecting minerals 
and making chemical experiments, he frequently neglected his assigned 
lessons, but these hobbies led him to make the acquaintance of some famous 
mineral collectors, among them Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (13). 



Friedrich Wohler 


347 


Wbhler was always greatly inter- 
ested in new elements. Soon after 
Berzelius discovered selenium in 
Swedish sulfuric acid, Wohler found 
that the Bohemian acid also contained 
it. Soon after Professor Stromeyer 
discovered cadmium, young Wohler 
sent him some that he had prepared 
from zinc. Wohler's great ambition 
was to make potassium, but since his 
voltaic pile made of alternate layers of 
Russian copper coins and zinc plates 
was not powerful enough for this, he 
devised a purely chemical method, 
somewhat similar to that of Gay- 
Lussac and Thenard, in which he 
heated a mixture of potash and char- 
coal to white heat in a graphite cru- 
cible. Since his sister shared the 
exhausting labor of blowing the bel- 
lows, she rejoiced as much as he did 
when the shining globules of metallic 
potassium appeared (13). 

The youthful Wohler also had many 
other interests. He won prizes in 
mathematics, made oil paintings and etchings, collected coins and other 
small objects from Roman ruins, and read with enjoyment the best German 
poetry. At the age of nineteen years he began his medical course at the 
University of Marburg, but in the following year he transferred to Heidel- 
berg in order to study under Leopold Gmelin (47 ) . He was deeply interested 
in medicine, and intended to become a practicing physician specializing in 
obstetrics. On September 2, 1823, he received the degree of Doctor of 
Medicine, Surgery, and Obstetrics, insigni cum laude (13). 

He had continued his chemical experiments all throughhis medical course, 
and Professor Gmelin, who had not failed to notice his surprising skill, 
advised him to relinquish medicine for chemistry. Wohler therefore wrote 
to Berzelius for permission to enter his laboratory in Stockholm. On 
August 1 the great Swedish master gave his famous reply: “One who has 
studied under the direction of Herr Leopold Gmelin will certainly find little 
to learn with me You may come when you wish." 

Berzelius must have realized at once that he had a remarkable student, 
for he started out by assigning him the difficult analysis of a zeolite. If 
Berzelius had a remarkable student, however, Wdhler also had a most 



From Muspratt's “Chemistry, Theoretical, 
Practical , and Analytical " 

Friedrich Wohler 
1800-1882 

German chemist. Student of Leo- 
pold Gmelin and Berzelius He was 
the first person to synthesize urea and 
to describe the properties of metallic 
aluminum. He isolated aluminum, 
beryllium, and yttrium by the action of 
potassium on the respective chlorides. 


348 


Discovery of the Elements 


unusual teacher, for he first went 
through the entire analysis himself, 
showing his student the details of 
every operation. Whenever Wohler 
worked too hastily, Berzelius re- 
marked, “Doctor, that was quick, but 
poor”* (13). Although Wohler spent 
less than a year in Stockholm, the 
teaching of Berzelius influenced the 
whole course of his life and, like his 
great master, he made important 
contributions both to organic and to 
inorganic chemistry. Minds such as 
these cannot be encompassed within 
narrow boundaries. As long as 
Berzelius lived, he carried on a lively 
correspondence with Wohler, and 
these letters are a rich source of pleas- 
ure and profit to all chemists inter- 
ested in the history of their science. 

In 1825 Wohler became a mem- 
ber of the chemistry faculty at the 
University of Berlin, and in 1828 he 



This WOhler Plaque, Cast in Alu- 
minum, Was Presented to Dr. F. B. 
Dainsby Dr. Howard M. Elsby, West- 
fNOHousE Research Laboratory, East 
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 

For the history of it, see ref. (50). 



From Musprail's *' Chemistry , Theoretical, 
Practical , and Analytical M 

Leopold Gmelin 
1788-1853 

Professor of chemistry and medi- 
cine at Heidelberg. First author of the 
“ Handbuch der anorganischen Chemie." 
Discoverer of potassium ferricyanide. 
Son of Johann Friedrich Gmelin, the 
author of the " Geschichte der Chemie” 
Leopold’s nephew, Christian Gottlob 
Gmelin, was the first to observe the 
red color imparted to a flame by lithium 
salts. 

was made a full professor. It was 
here that he made the two great 
discoveries for which his name will 
always be honored: the isolation of 
aluminum and the synthesis of urea. 

As previously stated, Wdhler was 
unable to obtain metallic aluminum by 
Oersted’s method. However, since 
the latter encouraged him to continue 
his attempts, he prepared some anhy- 
drous aluminum chloride by Oersted’s 
method, and devised a new plan for 
isolating the metal. After adding an 
excess of hot potassium carbonate 
solution to a boiling hot solution of 


Doctor, das war schnell, aber schUcht” 


Justus von Liebig 
1803-1873 

German organic and agricultural chemist. Professor of chemistry at 
Giessen. Friend and collaborator of W6hler. Discoverer of the isomerism 
of silver fulminate and silver cyanate. Editor of the Annalen. He devised a 
new combustion train for determining the ultimate constituents of organic 
compounds* and proved that animal heat and energy are produced by the 
combustion of food in the body. 



350 


Discovery of the Elements 



WOhler’s Residence at GOttingbn 

alum, he washed and dried the precipitated aluminum hydroxide, and mixed 
it with powdered charcoal, sugar, and oil to form a thick paste. Upon 
heating this paste in a closed crucible, he secured a very intimate mixture 
of alumina and charcoal, and upon passing a current of dry chlorine gas 
over this red-hot black mixture, he obtained anhydrous aluminum chlo- 
ride (12), ( 46 ). 

Wohler once said that the method by which he isolated aluminum in 1827 
was based on the decomposition of anhydrous aluminum chloride by 
potassium and on the stability of aluminum in presence of water. Since 
the reaction is too violent to be carried out in glass, he used a platinum 
crucible with the cover wired on. Although only gentle heat was applied to 
start the reaction, the crucible soon became white hot. It was not badly 
attacked, but in Order to prepare aluminum free from platinum he repeated 
the experiment, using porcelain and Hessian crucibles. When he cooled 
the crucible completely and plunged it into water, metallic aluminum al- 
ways separated as a gray powder. Wohler obtained only a small quantity 
of the metal, and it was not pure, but contaminated with potassium, 
platinum, or aluminum chloride ( 12 ). However, he was the first to de- 
scribe the properties of aluminum, and in 1845 he finally succeeded in 
melting the powder to a coherent metallic mass ( 49 ), ( 54 ). He also pre- 
pared beryllium and yttrium in the same manner (<?). 

Wohler's life was a long and eventful one. In spite of his unceasing 
labors for science, he found time for many social contacts, and had a deep 
capacity for friendship. The lifelong intimacy between Wohler and Liebig 
caused the latter to write in one of his last letters : 



Friedrich Wohler 


351 


Even after we are dead and our bodies long returned to dust, the ties 
which united us in life will keep our memory green, as an instance — 
not very frequent — of two men who wrought and strove in the same 
field without envy or ill feeling, and who continued in the closest 
friendship throughout (14). 

In 1835 Wbhler became Stromeyer’s successor as professor of chemistry 
at Gottingen, where he taught for the rest of his life. Wohler spent his old 
age in the midst of his happy family. 

He had a son and four daughters, and 
when they all visited their parents in 
the summer, some of them stayed with 
the neighbors, for the family home was 
not large enough to hold all the grand- 
children. He received high scientific 
honors of all kinds, but none were dearer 
to him than the celebrations planned by 
his students on the occasions of his six- 
tieth, seventieth, and eightieth birth- 
days, and on the fiftieth anniversary of 
the synthesis of urea (13), (48). 

The late Dr. Edgar Fahs Smith, 

America’s great chemical historian, 
once gave the following picture of the 
aged Wohler: 

Two or three days before Christ- 
mas the chemical laboratories in 
the University of Gottingen were 
nearly deserted. Only a few stu- 
dents remained. Late in the after- 
noon, some one began singing, 

“Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht.” 

One by one the other students in 
the laboratory gathered about the 
singer and solemnly joined in the 
song. Soon we noticed that the 
door of the laboratory opened and 
in walked the old Master. Immediately he took from his head the black 
skull cap he was accustomed to wear in the laboratories, placed it under 
his arm, folded his hands, and with bowed head stood just inside the door 
while the song continued. When the singing was over the old Master 
came forward and said, “Thank you, gentlemen,’* and withdrew (15). 

Wohler's room was filled with portraits of his two best friends, Liebig and 
Berzelius. Not long before his death, he hesitatingly held oiit to a friend at 
parting a little box wrapped in paper, saying to him, “Keep it in re- 



Louis-L^once 6lib de Beaumont 
1798-1874 

French geologist and mining engi- 
neer. Perpetual secretary of the Acad- 
emic des Sciences. He described the 
course of great rivers and the effects of 
their mechanical work, and investi- 
gated the materials ejected by volca- 
noes. With Dufr6noy he made the 
first accurate and complete geological 
map of France. 



Photo loaned by Frau HUckel, Gottingen , Germany 


W6hlbr in Later Life* 

Professor of chemistry at Gottingen. Famous for his researches on 
cyanogen, cyanuric acid, and the radical of benzoic acid, and on the metals 
titanium, aluminum, yttrium, beryllium, and vanadium. German trans- 
lator of Berzelius' "Textbook of Chemistry" and von Hisinger's "Mineral 
Geography/' 

* The author acknowledges her gratitude to the late Dr. L. C. Newell for the use of this 
portrait. 



Henri Sainte-Claire Deville 


353 


membrance of me. Do not open it until you are on the train.” The box 
was found to contain a spoon and the words, “A present from Berzelius; he 
used this platinum spoon many years in his researches.” Wohler died on 
October 9, 1882. In accordance with his wish, there is no bronze or 

marble monument to mark 

his resting place, but only a 
stone with the name Fried- 
rich Wohler ( 13 ). 

The first pure aluminum was 
prepared by the great French 
chemist, Henri Sainte-Claire 
Deville, who was born on the 
Island of St. Thomas in the 
Antilles on March 11, 1818. 

Both Henri and his elder 
brother Charles were educated 
at the Institution Sainte- 
Barbe in Paris, where Charles 
studied geology under £lie de 
Beaumont at the School of 
Mines, while Henri took the 
medical course and studied 
chemistry under Thenard. 

Both brothers were crowned 
by the Institute, and both 
were in the same section. 

. From Gay’s " Henri Sainte-Claire Deville, sa Vie et ses 

Throughout then* lives they Travaux" 

had the deepest affection for Charles Sainte-Claire Deville 

one another, and when one of 1814-1876 

Henri's sons married Charles' 

daughter, one of the fathers re- the allotropic forms of sulfur. 

marked, My brother and I do Henri Sainte-Claire Deville 

not know how to tell which of 1818-1881 

the two belongs to each of us, Professor of chemistry and dean at the Univer- 
, , sity of Besancon, afterward professor of chem- 

whether it is my son who has ist ^ at the 6 c0 Ie Noraiale Sup&ieure. He 
married his daughter, or my discovered toluene in balsam of Tolu, prepared 
, A anhydrous nitrogen pentoxide, and made sodium 

daughter who has married and aluminum on a commercial scale. 

his son” (16). 

Henri's first paper, published in 1839, was a research on turpentine, and 
two years later he discovered toluene in balsam of Tolu. His most im- 
portant work, however, was in inorganic and physical chemistry. In 1844 
conservative university officials were horrified to learn of the appointment 
by Thenard of the twenty-six-year-old Henri Sainte-Claire Deville as dean 


354 


Discovery of the Elements 



Courtesy H. N. Holmes 


Frank Fanning Jewett 
1844-1926 

Research assistant at Harvard Uni- 
versity, under Wolcott Gibbs. Pro-' 
fessor of chemistry at the Imperial Uni- 
versity of Japan. Professor of chem- 
istry and mineralogy at Oberlin College. 
His account of Wohler’s researches on 
aluminum inspired Charles M. Hall to 
search for a commercial" process for 
preparing the metal. 


to reorganize the faculty at Besan^on. 
Nevertheless, Thenard’s mature judg- 
ment proved correct, and Sainte- 
Claire Deville’s career proved to be 
even more brilliant than he had pre- 
dicted. While at Besangon, Sainte- 
Claire Deville devised new analytical 
methods for testing the city water 
supply, and succeeded in preparing 
anhydrous nitrogen pentoxide (27). 

When Balard, the discoverer of 
bromine, went to the College de 
France, Deville was called to fill the 
vacancy at the ficole Normale Su- 
p£rieure, and it was there that the 
first beautiful aluminum ingots were 
made. Sainte-Claire Deville was at- 
tempting in 1854 to prepare a proto- 
chloride of aluminum by allowing 
aluminum to react with the chloride, 
AlCls, and in preparing his aluminum 
he used Wohler’s method, but sub- 
stituted sodium for the potassium. 
He noticed some large globules of 
shining metallic aluminum, and im- 
mediately set to work to make the 


process commercially profitable (35). 

Although the first experiments were made at the ficole Normale Su- 
p6rieure, the generosity of Napoleon III made it possible for him to con- 
tinue them on a larger scale at the Javel works. Since Sainte-Claire 
Deville’s commercial process required large amounts of sodium, it was 
necessary for him to perfect at the same time a cheaper process for prepar- 
ing that metal. When he began his experiments, the price of sodium was 
even higher than that of potassium, but he knew that sodium compounds 
are more abundant in Nature than those of potassium, and that sodium, 
because of its smaller equivalent weight, would be the more economical 
metal to use. 

After perfecting a process for the manufacture of sodium (which caused 
the price to fall from two thousand francs per kilogram in 1855 to ten francs 
in 1891), Deville attempted the large-scale production of aluminum. 
There is found in southern France and elsewhere an ore, bauxite, named 
for the village of Baux, near Aries in Provence. In the Sainte-Claire 
Deville process, alumina obtained from this ore is intimately mixed with 


Sainte-Claire Deville’s Aluminum 


355 


charcoal and salt, and heated in an atmosphere of chlorine gas, a double 
chloride of sodium and aluminum being formed, which acts as a flux and 
allows the aluminum globules to coalesce. The metallic aluminum is then 
cast into ingots (18). 

Certain trouble makers who were poor judges of character tried to create 
ill-will between Wohler and Sainte-Claire Deville, advising the latter that, 
since Wohler’s aluminum was of such doubtful purity, he ought to claim 
for himself the honor of discovering the metal. The French chemist’s re- 
action to this counsel throws an interesting side-light on his character. As 
soon as he had obtained a sufficient 
quantity of malleable aluminum, 
he had a medal cast, bearing simply 
the name Wohler and the date 
1827, and sent it to the great Ger- 
man master. Deville and Wohler 
always remained fast friends, and 
collaborated in a number of im- 
portant researches. In his book 
entitled “L Aluminium, ses Propri- 
6tds, sa Fabrication et ses Applica- 
tions,” the former wrote, “I will 
say with pleasure that I consider 
it an unexpected good fortune to 
have been able to take a few more 
steps in a path opened by Berzelius’ 
eminent successor in Germany” 

(18). 

Henri Sainte-Claire Deville also 
made important investigations of 
boron, silicon, magnesium, and the 
metals of the platinum family. 

The platinum researches were 
dangerous, and he often suffered 
severely from poisoning by the 
vapors of osmic acid. His fame, however, rests even more on his enunci- 
ation of the laws of gaseous dissociation. Sainte-Claire Deville was de- 
scribed as ardent, vivacious, charming, sympathetic, gay, and generous. 
At the ficole Normale he used to eat at the students’ table, jesting famili- 
arly with them but never for a moment losing their profound respect (19). 
His married life was a most happy one, and his five sons were a credit 
to their parents. He died in 1881, mourned by his family and by his 
scientific colleagues throughout the world (18), and the funeral oration was 
delivered by Pasteur. 



Courtesy Fisher Scientific Co. 


The Aluminum " Crown Jewels” 

In this chest, carefully preserved by the 
Aluminum Company of America at Pitts- 
burgh, are the original buttons of the metal 
made by Charles M. Hall in Oberlin, Febru- 
ary 23, 1886 (left), the larger ones made by 
Hall in December, 1886 (center), and the 
first button or ingot (right) produced by the 
Aluminum Company of America. 






; 




Courtesy Fisher Scientific Co. 


Charles Martin Hall 
1863-1914 


American chemist, inventor, metallurgist, and philanthropist who developed 
a highly successful electrolytic process for manufacturing aluminum. This cheap 
method of obtaining the metal from its ores made possible the present wide- 
spread use of aluminum for domestic, industrial, and transportation purposes. 



C. M. Hall and P.-L.-T. H6roult 


357 


The next scene of the aluminum drama is laid in the United States. 
Henri Sainte-Claire Deville’s process had made the metal a commercial 
product, but it was still expensive. Charles Martin Hall, a student at 
Oberlin College, inspired by the accounts which Professor F. F. Jewett had 
given of his studies under Wohler, decided that his supreme aim in life would 
be to devise a cheap method for making aluminum. In an improvised 
laboratory in the woodshed, and with home-made batteries, he struggled 
with this problem. On February 23,1886, this boy of twenty-one years 


rushed into his professor's office and 
held out to him a handful of aluminum 
buttons. Since these buttons led to 
a highly successful electrolytic process 
for manufacturing aluminum, it is 
small wonder that the Aluminum 
Company of America now treasures 
them and refers to them affectionately 
as the “crown jewels." A beautiful 
statue of the youthful Charles M. 
Hall, cast in aluminum, may now 
be seen at Oberlin College (II), 
( 55 ). 

At about the same time that Hall 
perfected his process, Dr. Paul -Louis - 
Toussaint H^roult, a young French 
chemist of the same age, made the 
same discovery independently. Dr. 
H6roult was bom in 1863 at Thury- 
Harcourt in the department of Calva- 
dos. f When the war of 1870 broke 



out, he was sent to live with his 
grandfather in London, and thus he 
acquired a good command of the 
English language. Three years later 
he returned to France to continue his 


French metallurgist. Independent 
discoverer of the electrolytic method of 
preparing aluminum now known as the 
Hall-Heroult process. He designed 
electric furnaces, and made many im- 
portant contributions to the electro^ 
metallurgy of iron and steel. 


education. 


At the Institution Sainte-Barbe he learned of Sainte-Claire Deville’s re- 
searches on aluminum, and at the age of fifteen years he read the latter’s 
famous treatise. Using the steam engine and dynamo of a small tannery 
which he had inherited in 1885, Heroult attempted to electrolyze various 


* The author is most grateful to Aluminum, Hobbs, Bruce Publishing Co., for the por- 
trait of Heroult. 

t Vauquelin, the discoverer of chromium and beryllium, was also a native of 
Calvados. 


358 


Discovery of the Elements 


aluminum compounds. In the following year, when he was attempting to 
electrolyze cryolite, his iron cathode melted. Since the temperature was 
not high enough to account for this, H6roult realized that an alloy had been 
formed. A few days later, when he tried to lower the temperature of the 
electrolytic bath by adding some sodium aluminum chloride, he noticed 
that the carbon anode was being attacked. He concluded that he must be 
dealing with an oxide of aluminum, which was being reduced at the expense 
of the anode. This was indeed the case, for the sodium aluminum chloride 
he had bought had been previously exposed to moist air and converted into 
hydrated alumina. The first Hdroult patent for this process was an- 
nounced shortly before the Hall patents (77). 

M. H6roult also made many important contributions to the electrometal- 
lurgy of iron and steel. He made frequent trips to the United States, and 
when the Perkin Medal was awarded to Charles M. Hall in 1911, M. H6- 
roult crossed the ocean in order to be present at the ceremony and congratu- 
late him. By this gracious act, he proved himself to be a worthy successor 
of his great, generous countryman, Henri Sainte-Claire Deville (12), (52). 
Dr. H6roult and C. M. Hall both died in 1914. 

Literature Cited 

* 

(1) NordenskiOld, A. E., “Scheeles nachgelassene Briefe und Aufzeichnungen," 
Norstedt & S6ner, Stockholm, 1892, p. 151. Letter of Scheele to Gahn, Dec. 
26, 1774. 

(2) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie," Vol. 1, Baudry et Cie., Paris, 1891, pp. 
695-703. 

(3) Buggr, G., “Das Buch der grossen Chemiker l ,, Vol. 1, Verlag Chemie, Berlin, 
1929, pp. 386-404. 

(4) Davy, J., “Memoirs of the Life of Sir Humphry Davy, Bart.," Vol. 1, Longman, 
Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman, London, 1836, p. 469. 

(5) Mellor, J. W., “Comprehensive Treatise on Inorganic and Theoretical Chem- 
istry," Vol. 4, Longmans, Green and Co., London, 1923, pp. 204-7. Article on 
beryllium. 

(6) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie," ref (2), Vol. 2, pp. 169-72. 

(7) Bussy, A.-A.-B., “Preparation du glucinium,” J. chim. medicale, 4 , 453 (1828); 

Dingl. poly . 29, 466 (1828). 

(8) W6hlbr, F., “Sur le Glucinium et l’Yttrium," Ann. chim. phys., [2], 39, 77-84 
(1828). 

(9) Jagnaux, R., “Histoire de la Chimie," ref. (2), Vol. 1, pp. 707-10. 

(10) Crell, L., “Lebensgeschichte A. S. Marggraf’s," CrelVs Ann., 5, 181-92 (1786). 

( 11 ) Holmes H. N., “The story of aluminum," J. Chem. Educ., 7, 233-44 (Feb., 
1930). 

(12) Jagnaux, R. f “Histoire de la Chimie," ref. (2), Vol. 2, pp. 158-64. 

( 13 ) von Hofmann, A. W. f “Zur Erinnerung an Friedrich Wtfhler," Ber. t 15, 3127- 
290 (1882). 

( 14 ) von Hofmann, A. W. and Emilie WOhlbr, “Aus Justus Liebig’s und Friedrich 
Wdhler’s Briefwechsel," Vol. 2, F. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 1888 , p. 324. 
Letter of Liebig to Wohler, Dec. 31. 1871. 



Literature Cited 359 

(15) “Some experiences of Dr. Edgar F. Smith as a student under Wohler/* J. Chem. 
Educ., 5, 1555 (Dec., 1928). 

(16) Gay, “Henri Sainte-Claire Deville; Sa Vie et ses Travaux,” Gauthier- Villars et 
Fils, Paris, 1889, p. 5 

(17) Ibid., p. 9. 

(18) Ibid., p . 33 

(19) Vallery-Radot, R., “The Life of Pasteur/* Doubleday, Page and Co., New York 
City, 1926, p. 146. 

(20) “Oeuvres de Lavoisier,” Vol. 1, Imprimerie Imperiale, Paris, 1864, pp. 135-7. 

(21) Gay-Lussac, L.-J. and L.-J. Thenard, “Sur la decomposition et la recomposition 
de l’acide boracique,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 68, 169-74 (Nov. 30, 1808); Sci. 
News Letter, 19, 171-2 (Mar. 14, 1931). 

(22) Klaproth, M. H., “Analytical Essays towards Promoting the Chemical Knowl- 
edge of Mineral Substances,” Cadell and Davies, London, 1801, pp. 325-8. 

(23) Vauquelin, N.-L., “Analyse de Taigue marine, ou beril; et d4eouverte dune 
terre nouvelle dans cette pierrc,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 26, 155-77 (May (30 
Flor£al), 1798); “Discovering the sweet element: A classic of science,” Sci. 
News Letter, 18, 346-7 (Nov. 29, 1930); Nicholson's J., 2, 358-63 (Nov., 1798); 
393-6 (Dec. 1798). 

(24) Stock, A. E., “Beryllium/* 7 Wans. Electrochem. Soc., 61, 255-74 (1932). 

(25) Vauquelin, N.-L.. “Analyse de l'6meraude du Perou,” Ann. chim. phys., [1], 26, 
259-65 (June (30 Prairial), 1798). 

(26) Gmelin, J. F., “Analyse du b£ril de Nertschinsk en Sib6rie, et examen de quelques 
caract£res qui distinguent la glucine qu’il contient,” ibid. [1], 44, 27-9 (Oct., 
(30 Vend4miaire), 1803); Crell's Ann., 35, 87-102 (Zweytes Stuck, 1801). 

(27) Marchal, “La d£couverte, la preparation, les propri£t6s et les applications du 
glucinium/* Chimie et Industrie, 22, 1084-92 (Dec., 1929); 23, 30-3 (Jan., 1930). 

(28) Davy, H., “Electro-chemical researches on the decomposition of the earths; 
with observations on the metals obtained from the alkaline earths, and on the 
amalgam procured from ammonia,” Phil. Trans., 98, 343 (1808). Read June 
30, 1808; “An account of some new analytical researches on the nature of certain 
bodies, particularly the alkalies, phosphorus, sulphur, carbonaceous matter, and 
the acids hitherto undecompounded, etc./* ibid., 99, 75-85 (1809). Read Dec. 15, 
1808. 

(29) Lebeau, P., “Recherches sur le glucinium et ses composes/* Ann. chim. phys., 
[7], 16, 457-503 (Apr., 1899). 

(30) Biot, J.-B., “Melanges Scientifiques et Litt£raires,” Vol. 3, Michel Levy Freres, 
Paris, 1858, pp. 125-42. 

(31) Sainte-Claire Deville, H., “Note sur deux proc4d4s de preparation de l’alu- 
minium et sur une nouvelle forme du silicium,” Compt. rend., 39, 321-6 (Aug. 14, 
1854); J. pharm. chim., (3), 26, 285-9 (Oct., 1854); J. prakt. Chem., 63, 113-20 
(Zweites Heft, 1854); “Du silicium et du titane/* Copipt. rend., 40, 1034-6 (Apr. 
30, 1855). 

(32) Berzelius, J. J., “On the results of some chemical analyses, and the decompo- 
sition of silica/’ Annals of Phil., [1], 24, 121-3 (Aug., 1824). Extract from letter 
to Dulong. 

(33) Gay, “Henri Sainte-Claire Deville, Sa Vie et ses Travaux,” ref. (16), pp. 37-9. 

(34) Sainte-Claire Deville, H. and Caron, “Du silicium et des siliciures m4tal- 
liques,” Ann. chim. phys., [3], 67, 435-43 (Apr., 1863). 

(35) Sainte-Claire Deville, H., “Recherches sur les m4taux et en particulier sur 



360 Discovery of the Elements 

raluminium et sur une nouvelle forme du silicium,” ibid., [3], 43 f 7-33 (Jan., 
1855). 

(36) Davy, H., “Some new phenomena of chemical changes produced by electricity, 
particularly the decomposition of the fixed alkalies, and the exhibition of the 
new substances which constitute their bases, etc.,” Phil. Trans., 98,43 (1808). 
Read Nov. 19, 1807. 

(37) Friend, J, H., “A Textbook of Inorganic Chemistry,” Vol. 5, Chas. Griffin and 
Co., London, 1917, pp. 176-81. 

(38) Gay-Lussac, L.-J. and L.-J. Thenard, “Recherches Physico-Chimiques,” Vol. 

1, Imprimerie de Crapelet, Paris, 1811, pp. 276-308. 

(39) Ibid., Vol. 1, pp. 313-4; Vol. 2, pp. 54-65. 

(40) Bugge, G., “Das Buchder grossen Chemiker,” ref. (3), Vol. 1, pp. 228-39. 
Article on Marggraf by Max Speter. 

(41) Lenard, Philipp, “Grosse Naturforscher,” J. F. Lehmanns Verlag, Munchen, 
1929, pp. 183-8. 

(42) Edwards, Frary, and Jeffries, “The Aluminum Industry,” Vol. 1. McGraw- 
Hill Book Co., Inc., New York, 1930, pp. 1-43. 

(43) Oersted, H. C., “Oversigt over det Kongelige Danskc Vidcnskabernes Selskabs 
Forhandlinger,” 1824-25, 15-6. 

(44) Meyer, Kirstine, “H. C. Oersted,” Naturvidenskabelige Skrifter, Copenhagen, 

2, 465 (1920). 

(45) Fogh, I., “Det Kgl. Danskc Videnskabernes Selskab Mathematiskfysiske Med- 
delelser,” 3, 3-17 (1921). (In German.) 

(46) Wohler, F., “Sur l’aluminium,” Ann . chim. phys ., [2], 37, 66-80 (1828;; Pogg. 
Ann., 11, 146-61 (1827). 

(47) Editor’s Outlook, “Friedrich Wohler,” J. Chem. Educ., 5, 1537-8 (Dec., 1928). 

(48) Warren, W. H., “Contemporary reception of Wohler’s discovery of the syn- 
thesis of urea,” ibid., 5, 1539-53 (Dec., 1928). 

(49) Bugge, G., “Das Buch der grossen Chemiker,” ref. (3), Vol. 2. p. 37; A. W. von 
Hofmann and Emilie Wohler, “Aus Justus Liebig’s und Friedrich Wohler’s 
Briefwechsel ” ref (14), Vol. 1, p 251. 

(50) Warren, W. H., “The Wohler plaque,” J. Chem. Educ., 6, 559 (Mar., 1929). 

(51) Wbintraub, E., “Preparation and properties of pure boron,” Trans. Am. Electro - 
chem. Soc., 16, 165-84 (1909). 

(52) “Award of the Perkin medal to C. M, Hall,” J. Ind . Eng. Chem., 3, 144-9 (March, 
1911); Reprinted by L. A. Goldblatt, “Collateral Readings in Inorganic Chem- 
istry,” D. Appleton-Century Co., New York and London, 1937, pp. 187-92. 

(53) ToSterud, M., and J. D. Edwards, “The ‘discovery’ of aluminum,” Trans. Am. 
Electrochem. Soc., 51, 125-8 (1927) 

(54) Rheinboldt, H., “Hundert Jahre Aluminium,” Sitzungsber. der Niederrhein 
Gesellschaft fiir Natur- und Heilkunde, Bonn, 1928, 20 pp.; Metallwirtschaft , 6, 
2 (1927). 

(55) Holmes, H. N., "Fifty years of industrial aluminum, 1886-1936,” Bulletin of 
Oberlin College, N. S., No. 346, 1-30 (Aug. 30, 1937) ; Sci. Mo. t 42, 236-9 (March, 
1936). 

(56) Chbyne, T. K. and J. S. Black, “Encyclopaedia Biblica,” The Macmillan Com- 
pany, New York, 1899, vol. 1, columns 545-6; Pliny the Elder, “Historia 
Naturalis,” Book 37, chaps. 16-20. 

(57) Nasini, R., “Discovery of boric acid in the glazes of Aretine vases,” Compt. rend., 
191, 903-5 (Nov. 10, 1930); Nature , 126, 877-8 (Dec. 6, 1930). 



Literature Cited 361 

(58) Diergart, Paul, “Bemerkung zum neuerlichen Borbefund in der Terra-sigillata- 
Glasur,” Chem. Ztg., 60, 997 (Dec. 5, 1936). 

(59) Kopp, H., “Geschichte der Chemie," Fr. Vieweg und Sohn, Braunschweig, 1847, 
vol. 3, pp. 339-44. 

(60) “Pott's Auszug aus einem Briefe des H. Sam. Ben. Cnoll iiber das indianische 
naturliche Alkali und den Borax," CrelVs Neues chem. Archiv, 3, 317-20 (1786); 
Abh. konigl. Akad. Wiss. (Berlin), 1735-42, p. 318. 

(61) Grill, Johan Abraham (Abrahamsson), “Vom Pounxa, oder natiirlichen 
Borax," CrelVs Neueste Entdeckungen in der Chemie, 1, 84-6 (1781) ; K. Vet. Acad. 
Handle 34, 317 (1772). 

(62) “Eloge de M. Guillaume Homberg,” Hist, de l’Acad. Roy. (Paris), 1715, pp. 82 

ff. 

(63) Peters, Hermann, “Wilhelm Homberg. Mitteilungen aus Briefen der konig- 
lichen Bibliothek zu Hannover,” Chem. Zig., 27, 1249-52 (Dec. 23, 1903). 

(64) Jaeger, F. M., “Naschrift: Willem Homi erg,” Chem. Weekhl ., 15, 602-5 (1918). 

(65) “Ueber das Sedativsalz vom Herrn Bourdelin,” CrelVs Neues chem. Archiv , 7, 89- 
111 (1788); Abh. der kdnigl. Akad. der Wiss. zu Paris, 1753; M6m. de math, et 
de phys., p. 305. 

(66) Bergman, T., “A dissertation on Elective Attractions,” J. Murray, London, 
1785, p. 127. 

(67) Scherer, A. N., “Sur le radical boracique," Ann. chirn. phys. (1), 31, 17 (1799). 
(30 Messidor, an VII*. ) 

(68) Hunt, Robert, “Ure’s Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures, and Mines,” Long- 
mans, Green and Co., London, 1867, 6th ed., vol. 1, pp. 100-03. 

(69) Muspratt, Sheridan, “Chemistry, Theoretical, Practical, and Analytical,” 
Wm. Mackenzie, London, Glasgow and Edinburgh, 1803, vol. 1, pp. 149-76. 

(70) Purchas, Samuel, “Hakluytus Posthumus, or Purchas His Pilgrimes," James 
MacLehose and Sons, Glasgow, 1906, vol. 11, p. 146. Journal of Friar William 
de Rubruquis. 

(71) Testi, Gino, “Le antiche miniere de allume e l’arte tintoria in Italia,” Archeion, 
13, 440-8 (1931). 

(72) Klaproth, M. H., “Chemische Untersuchung des Alaunsteins von Tolfa und des 
redigen Alaunschiefers von Freienwalde," Gehlen’s J. (2), 6, 35-54 (1806); L.-J. 
Gay-Lussac, “Nachtrag zu vorstehender Analyse des Alaunsteins von Tolfa,” 
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(73) Hoover, H. C. and L. H. Hoover, “Georgius Agricola. De re metallica,” Min- 
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(74) Marggraf, A. S., “Von den Bestandtheilen des Alauns," CrelVs Neues chem. 
Archiv , 6, 216-24 (1787); Abh. konigl. Akad. Wiss. (Berlin), 1754; “Chymische 
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(75) O'Connor, A. C., “Oeuvres de Condorcet,” Firmin Didot Fr&res, Paris, 1847, 
vol. 2, pp. 598-610. Eulogy of Marggraf. 

(76) Testi, Gino, “Sulla presenza dell’acido borico nelle ceramiche aretine," Archeion, 
15, 247-8 (1933). 

(77) Gmelins Handb. der auorg. Chem., 8th ed., No. 35 A-l, Verlag Chemie, G. m. 
b. H., Berlin, 1934, p. 125. 



Courtesy S. E. Sheppard 

William Henry Fox Talbot 
1800-1877 

English antiquarian, physicist, and pioneer in optics and photography. One 
of the first to decipher the Assyrian inscriptions at Nineveh. In 1839 he made 
negative prints on silver chloride paper, and two years later he invented the calo- 
type process for making positives. 




XX. SOME SPECTROSCOPIC DISCOVERIES 


Many elements are present in the earth* s crust in such minute amounts that 
they could never have been discovered by ordinary methods of mineral analysis . 
In 1859 , however , Kirchhoff and Bunsen invented the spectroscope , an optical 
instrument consisting of a collimator , or metal tube fitted at one end with a lens, 
and closed at the other except for a slit at the focus of the lens , to admit light 
from the incandescent substance to be examined; a turntable containing a 
prism mounted to receive and separate the parallel rays from the lens; and a 
telescope to observe the spectrum produced by the prism . With this instru- 
ment they soon discovered two new metals , cesium and rubidium , which they 
classified with sodium, potassium, and lithium , which had been previously 
discovered by Davy and Arfwedson. The spectroscopic discovery of thallium 
by Sir William Crookes and its prompt confirmation by C. A. Lamy soon 
followed . In 1863 F. Reich and H. T. Richter of the Freiberg School of Mines 
discovered a very rare element in zinc blende , and named it indium because oj 
its brilliant line in the indigo region of the spectrum. 


Nur immer zu! wir wollen es ergrunden, 

In deinem Nichts hoff ' ich das All zu finden ( 1 ).* 

Thus there was for him nothing small or great in Nature. 

Every phenomenon embraced for him an endless diversity 
of factors , and in the yellow flame of an ordinary alcohol 
lamp whose wick was sprinkled with salt , he saw the pos- 
sibility of accomplishing the chemical analysis of the most 
distant stars (2). f 

In 1758 Marggraf noticed the yellow color imparted to a flame by sodium 
salts and the lavender color imparted by potassium salts (3). In 1802 Dr. 
Wollaston examined the spectrum of a candle flame through a prism, and 
saw the discontinuous band spectrum ( 4 ), (22). He said (33 ) : 

When a very narrow line of the blue light at the lower part of the 
flame is examined alone, in the same manner, through a prism, the 
spectrum, instead of appearing a series of lights of different hues 
contiguous, may be seen divided into five images, at a distance from 
each other. The 1st is broad red, terminated by a bright line of 
yellow; the 2nd and 3rd are both green; the 4th and 5th are blue, 
the last of which appears to correspond with the division of blue and 
violet in the solar spectrum. . . 

* But go on I We want to fathom it. 

In thy nothing I hope to find the universe. 

t So gab es fiir ihn nichts Kleines oder Grosses in der Natur. Jede Erscheinung 
umfasste ihm eine unbegrenzte Mannigfaltigkeit von Faktoren , und in der gelben Flamme 
einor gewohnlichen Weingeistlampe, deren Docht mil Salz bestreut war , sah er die Moglichr 
keit , die chemische Analyse der fernsten Gestirne auszufiikren , 

363 



364 


Discovery of the Elements 


In 1814 Josef Fraunhofer, a young German physicist who had had 
thorough training in the art of glassmaking, made an unusually fine prism, 
saw for the first time the dark lines in the sun's spectrum, and designated 
eight of the most prominent ones by letters ( 3 ), ( 23 ). Henry Fox Talbot 
( 24 ), an English scientist, found that, with the aid of a prism, he could 
distinguish lithium from strontium,* even though the salts of both give red 
flames ( 4 ), ( 26 ), ( 32 ). He stated that the dark lines previously observed 



Courtesy Bousch &• Lomb Optical Co. 


In 1818 Josef Fraunhofer (1787-1826) Exhibited His Newest Spectroscope 
before Counselor Utzschneidrr and Mr. Reichenbach, His Partners in the 
Glassworks and Optical Establishment at Benedictbeuern 

He discussed with them his latest researches on the diffraction of light which had 
led him to the discovery of grating spectra, the exact measurement of wave-lengths, and 
a brilliant confirmation of the undulatory theory of light. 

( The above illustration is from a painting by Karla Fischer, 1909.) 

by Sir David Brewster ( 33 ) in the spectrum of light which had passed 
through vapors of nitrous acid were caused by absorption of light ( 5 ), ( 25 ). 
In 1854 David Alter of Freeport, Pennsylvania, showed that each element 
studied had its own spectrum ( 53 ), ( 54 ), ( 56 ). A few years later Kirch- 
hoff and Bunsen firmly established the science of spectroscopic analysis. 

* Strontium salts were very rare at that time, and Talbot was indebted to Faraday 
for the specimen he used. 




Robert Bunsen 


365 


Robert Bunsen was the son of a 
professor of modern languages at 
Gottingen, and was born in that city 
cn March 31, 1811. After attend- 
ing the academy at Holzminden he 
entered the University of Gbttingen, 
and studied chemistry under Professor 
Stromeyer. At the age of twenty 
years he received his degree of doctor 
of philosophy. This does not mean 
that Bunsen was precocious, for, as 
Wilhelm Ostwald explains, students 
graduated at a much earlier age then 
than they do now. 

Aided by a grant from the Han- 
overian government, the youthful 
Bunsen broadened his scientific edu- 
cation by traveling, mostly on foot, 



Courtesy W. A. Jlomor 

Dr. David Alter 
1807-1881 


American physician, physicist, and 
inventor. He observed the spark 
spectra of various metals and gases 
and predicted that “the prism may 
also detect the elements in shooting 
stars, or luminous metpors.” 



Sir David Brewster 
1781-1868 

Scottish physicist famous for his 
researches on the absorption, reflection, 
refraction, and polarization of light, 
and on doubly refracting crystals. 
One of the founders of the British 
Association for the Advancement of 
Science. He invented the kaleido- 
scope and improved the stereoscope. 
His optical researches led to great 
improvement in the construction of 
lighthouses. 


through Germany, France, Austria, 
and Switzerland, and meeting the sci- 
entists of those countries. For three 
years he went about studying geologi- 
cal formations, visiting factories and 
mines, and meeting technical men and 
professors ( 2 ). In 1836 he succeeded 
Wohler at the higher technical school 
at Cassel. After serving in similar 
positions at Marburg and at Breslau, 
he finally became Leopold Gmelin’s 
successor at Heidelberg, where he 
taught for thirty-eight years, finally 
retiring at the venerable age of 
seventy-eight years ( 2 ), ( 50 ). 


366 


Discovery of the Elements 



Bunsen’s Old Laboratory at Heidelberg, Now Torn Down 


Bunsen’s very first paper contained a discovery of great benefit to 
humanity, for he showed that freshly precipitated ferric hydroxide is an 



Heinrich Debus 
1824-1915 

German chemist who taught for 
many years at Guy’s Hospital, Lon- 
don, and at the Royal Naval College, 
Greenwich. He prepared pure pur- 
purin, discovered glyoxylic acid, gly- 
oxal, and glyoxafine, and reduced 
hydrocyanic add to methylamine. 
He wrote a delightful biography of his 
professor, Robert Bunsen. 


antidote for arsenic poisoning. His 
important and dangerous research on 
cacodyl was carried out at Cassel and 
Marburg. Since his laboratory at 
Cassel was not equipped with hoods, 
he wore a mask with a long tube lead- 
ing to the fresh air. While he was 
investigating cacodyl cyanide, an ex- 
plosion occurred which shattered the 
mask, destroyed the sight of his right 
eye, and nearly ended his life; yet, 
after he recovered from the resulting 
critical illness, he carried the research 
to a successful conclusion* 

This serious accident made him 
very cautious. When one of his stu- 
dents, Heinrich Debus, once wished 
to use some mercuric fulminate in a re- 
search, Bunsen objected and said (6), 

When I came to Marburg, I 
found in the collection of prepara* 
tions a glass-stoppered bottle con- 
taining an ounce or more of mer- 
curic fulminate. I took the flask 


Cesium and Rubidium 


367 


and carried it to a nearby deep 
stone-quarry, and threw it in. 

Bunsen made a thorough study of 
the gases of the blast furnace, and it 
was in this connection that he de- 
veloped his famous methods of gas 
analysis. He invented the carbon- 
zinc battery, the grease-spot photom- 
eter, and the ice and vapor calorim- 
eters, and perfected the Bunsen 
burner. After the famous eruption 
of Mount Hekla in 1845, he went with 
a Danish expedition to study the ac- 
tive hot springs and geysers of Ice- 
land, and by careful thermometric 
measurements made at great risk, 
explained their action before any sci- 
entific description of the American 
geysers had been given (7), (27), (57). 

Cesium and Rubidium 

Bunsen afterward carried out an 
elaborate series of photochemical re- 
searches with his lifelong friend, 

Sir Henry Roscoe, but suddenly dis- 
continued this work. The reason for 
this may best be told in his own 
words as quoted from his letter to Roscoe written on November 15, 1859 (7) : 

At present [said he] Kirchhoff and I are engaged in a common work 
which doesn’t let us sleep. . . .Kirchhoff has made a wonderful, entirely 
unexpected discovery in finding the cause of the dark lines in the solar 
spectrum, and increasing them artificially in the sun’s spectrum, and 
in producing them in spectra which do not have lines, and in exactly 
the same position as the corresponding Fraunhofer lines. Thus a 
means has been found to determine the composition of the sun and 
fixed stars with the same accuracy as we determine sulfuric acid, chlo- 
rine, etc., with our chemical reagents. Substances on the earth can be 
determined by this method just as easily as on the sun, so that, for ex- 
ample, I have been able to detect lithium in twenty grams of sea water. 

Gustav Robert Kirchhoff, a young professor from Kdnigsberg, Prussia, 
who had recently followed Bunsen from Breslau to Heidelberg, is generally 
regarded as Bunsen’s greatest discovery of the Breslau period* Kirchhoff 
was bora in Kdnigsberg on March 12, 1824, the third son of a counselor of 
justice. When he was twenty-four years old, he became a member of the 



Gustav Robert Kirchhoff 
1824-1887 

German physicist and physical chem- 
ist. Professor of physics at Heidel- 
berg and Berlin. Independent dis- 
coverer of the Kirchhoff -Stewart law 
of radiation and absorption. He 
explained the Fraunhofer lines of the 
solar spectrum, and, with Bunsen, 
founded the science of spectroscopic 
analysis, and discovered the elements 
cesium and rubidium. 


368 


Discovery of the Elements 


teaching staff at the University of Berlin. After serving for a time as 
professor extraordinary at Breslau, he went to Heidelberg in 1854, and 
collaborated with Bunsen for many years. In 1875, however, he left the 
scene of his brilliant achievements, and went back to Berlin to serve as 
professor of physics and to work with Helmholtz. He died on October 17, 
1887, at the age of sixty-three years. 

Kirchhoff's mind was more speculative than Bunsen's, he had greater 
fondness for pure mathematics, and he was thoroughly familiar with the 
researches of Newton, Fraunhofer, and Clausius (8) t (46). He showed 
Bunsen that, instead of looking through colored glass to distinguish between 
similarly colored fl